


Iron

by castielsdemons



Series: Necessary Elements [2]
Category: Captain America (Movies), Marvel Cinematic Universe, The Avengers (Marvel Movies)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Fantasy, Alternate Universe - Witchcraft, Brainwashing, Brock Rumlow is an asshole, Canon-Typical Violence, M/M, Minor Character Death, POV Alternating, Pining, Pining Steve, Post-Serum Steve Rogers, Soul Bond, Spells & Enchantments, Winter Soldier Bucky Barnes, familiar bucky, hey guys make sure to take the 'graphic violence' warning seriously, witch steve
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-08
Updated: 2017-10-11
Packaged: 2018-07-29 11:01:04
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 20
Words: 56,743
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7681822
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/castielsdemons/pseuds/castielsdemons
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>While Steve’s SHIELD co-workers are sure that his ex-True Bond, Bucky Barnes, is dead, Steve himself won’t give up that easily. He’ll do anything, <i>anything</i>, to rescue Bucky and take him home. The only problem being that he needs to find him first, all while avoiding Hydra’s newest and most deadly asset: the Winter Soldier.</p><p>The Soldier is known for his quick and brutal assassinations, his deadly demeanor, and his inhumanly strong metal arm. And while Steve knows he shouldn’t be drawn to him, he is anyway—even if he knows he’s the Soldier’s next target.</p><p>(2/3)</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Prologue

**Author's Note:**

> Okay, a few things:  
> 1\. Rated mature for violence and other things, not sex. I might go back and re-rate it Teen, but I felt this was more fitting. If anyone has a problem with that, know that I don't give a fuck anymore.  
> 2\. Apologies that this is so late. I got a job last month and things have become hectic, and then on top of that, I've been battling writer's block. I wanted to get this chapter posted though, so people would know that I haven't given up on the series. Thanks for being cool about that. And thanks to my beta, who was patient while I was dilly-dallying AND gave me feedback AND proofread this. :)  
> 3\. From what I'm thinking now, the POV is going to be split between Steve and Bucky in parts (or "sections"). The parts may be uneven or whatever, but just go with it for now and I'm sure we'll all find a way to be happy. 
> 
> Anyway, enjoy this prologue, and the story that will eventually follow it. Leave me comments, because they give me life.

###### STEVE

He can’t help feeling like it’s all his fault.

It happens in slow motion: fists rain down on his skin like droplets of water. A scream builds up in his chest, between the lungs.

_Go, Bucky! Run!_

Steve was so terrified this day would come. He wanted Bucky to be ready for it, to know how to fight, to know how to change into his familiar form—a form that would be much faster than the average human.

Of course, Steve didn’t really account for the fact that Bucky would be down a limb when the day arrived.

The thought hits him like a freight train. _Bucky can’t defend himself._ Not with just one arm, he can’t.

He looks up from his position and notices that Bucky’s no longer in the doorway.

The scream that was building up in his chest rattles free from the confines of his body. The sound he makes is inhuman.  

His head rings with resonance with the people on the street. The sound of bells distracts and confuses him. The hot sun beats angrily on Steve’s neck. Honking cars produce a cacophony of noise in his ears but he can barely hear it.

The van. It turned at this intersection—the one he’s currently standing in the middle of—but which way? He can’t remember, he can’t remember, _he can’t fucking remember_ —

He swallows the lump in his throat as he turns this way and that, blocked by oncoming cars that honk viciously at him. Drivers point and yell. Strangers on the street look on curiously but then move on. Stranger things have happened in New York.

He fights the urge to collapse in the middle of the road. The Bond floods Bucky’s panic and fear into his own chest despite the distance now between them. Whichever way the van went, searching for it would be futile. It doesn’t matter which way it turned—Steve will never find it at this rate.

Bucky is long gone by now.

 

He thinks it over.

Steve notifies SHIELD and they arrive in record time to pick up the bodies of the Hydra agents he had punched unconscious.

SHIELD vehicles are there in under fifteen minutes. There are only about seven agents or so, and Steve knocked them back out every time they seemed to be stirring, so the whole process goes smoothly. They’re cuffed, dragged into the van, and hauled away seconds later. Efficient.

Several agents give him looks on their way out of the door. The Hydra team will be put in custody, questioned within an inch of their life. Steve doubts that they’ll break anytime soon. Hydra’s conditioning runs deep—it’s why they’re such a problem. 

And he just let those assholes in his house. He let them take Bucky.

He’s going to have to return to his co-workers with this information. The last thing he wants, though, is a tongue-lashing when he gets back to work, something his boss is going to be more than happy to give him. _How could your home have been breached? How did they find you? What did you do?_

Steve thinks it over. Anything he could’ve done differently, if he could’ve saved Bucky from being taken in the first place.

Well, for starters, he could have replenished the cloaking spell so they couldn’t have found them to begin with.

He slams his hands on the table in front of him with a growl, torn from his body.

He hangs his head and clenches his fists tight, fingernails digging into palms. He let them take Bucky. He was so wrapped up in himself, his own dramatic moment when Bucky hurt himself that he forgot to renew the cloaking charm over the house. He should have known that Hydra would have been watching and waiting for the right time to spring. He’s such a fucking idiot.

When the last Hydra agent is cuffed and loaded into the van, he runs upstairs quickly and bursts into Bucky’s room.

This house is compromised. They’re going to make him leave. They won’t think to pack up the things in Bucky’s room—SHIELD is just like that. Unsentimental. They’ll pack up Steve’s room, and they’ll take the worn trunk in the living room, and send it to another safehouse in boxes. That place will be just as unlived-in as the brownstone. It will look like something from a magazine. It will be beautiful, and it’ll be stylish, but it won’t be like home.

For years, Steve has lived in that brownstone. But it only became less like living in a hotel and more like coming home when Bucky was there.

He thinks it over. And over. And over. He thinks it over a couple hundred times and then he thinks about it some more.

Strategy is the one thing he always excelled at.

Perhaps he wasn’t the smartest kid in school. Perhaps he got C’s and D’s on his report card—never F’s, because Sarah would have killed him—and perhaps he only ever made it on the honor roll once or twice.

Maybe he wasn’t the fastest. The strongest. The best-looking. The funniest.

But he knows strategy. He knows how his enemy thinks and he knows how to work around it. It’s something he’s always known—it’s one of the reasons that SHIELD hired him in the first place.

So why the fuck didn’t he see this coming?


	2. Vacancy

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> LONG NOTE AHEAD!!
> 
> Hi there, pals. I've almost posted this a bunch of times in the past month but I always stopped myself for some reason. I've re-written this so many times, it's nothing like what I originally had in mind, but I think I've finally gotten myself under control. A lot has happened since you last heard from me! I started school, I quit the job I told you about, and I've been busy with clubs and whatnot. I finally sat down long enough to figure what I'm going to do with the next few chapters. I think perhaps I've nipped this writer's block in the bud for now.
> 
> Sorry for the month-long wait on the chapter, though. But! I started a little one-shot a few days ago and I was working on that. I think I might finish it soon. So keep an eye out for that! 
> 
> Anyway, about the story, I think I'm going to nix the shenanigans about "Parts" and have it mostly from Steve's POV and perhaps pepper in little instances from Bucky's POV. Maybe a few chapters, but not enough to warrant a change in parts. I don't know the exact schematics, but. Whatever.
> 
> OKAY. This chapter is a little slow-going, but I swear we'll just into the good stuff soon. It's gonna be crazy, kids.
> 
> EDIT 9/17/2016: This chapter is now beta-read! Thank you to my amazing beta :')

Somewhere in a trashcan in New York City, Steve thinks that his phone might be ringing.

He knows that ditching his phone probably wasn’t the greatest idea, since SHIELD bought it for him and he had taken such good care of it up until now. But he didn’t need it. No pictures that meant anything to him, no apps that he needed or anything. It’s fine.

What’s not fine is that Fury probably thinks he’s gone rogue. Which—well, it’s a bit true, but not in the traditional sense. He can see why Director Fury would think that, considering he cleared out his bank account, hasn’t returned his calls in two weeks, skipped town, and ditched his personal mobile phone for a burner.

Well, he knows in his _heart_ that he didn’t go rogue.

Whatever. He doesn’t care. What he _does_ care about is finding Bucky. It’s been almost two weeks since his disappearance, almost two weeks since those Hydra dipshits broke into Steve’s apartment and took the most important person in his life.

He had burst into Bucky’s room that morning and grabbed the single thing he needed to take from it—Bucky’s rock kit, the one that he bought from Wanda Maximoff. The one that he never got to use, because Steve never taught him any spells. On his way out, though, he spotted a tattered copy of _The Little Prince_ , so he grabbed that, too.

The rock kit is in the single duffel bag that Steve managed to take with him, minus one crystal. The moonstone holds a permanent place in Steve’s pocket.

He sits on the stiff motel bed with his old, clunky laptop, checking city security cameras. All the feeds are live and he can’t find any archives of past videos. Nothing that would date back to the day Bucky was taken.            

There have been absolutely no leads. He hasn’t felt Bucky’s emotions since that day. Hydra must be using some kind of ward or sigil to keep Bucky’s emotions from reaching him. There’s the possibility that Bucky is feeling Steve’s emotions but Steve isn’t feeling Bucky’s, but that doesn’t really help them. It just means Steve can’t use the Bond in any sort of way to reach Bucky. No way to communicate—even imperfectly—that Steve is searching for him.

In frustration, he punches his laptop, as if hitting it will magically make what he needs appear.

Steve scoffs. If only there was a way to actually use magic to make it appear. But, as most people know, magic and technology mix much like oil and water: they don’t.

The screen shatters under his knuckles and goes dark. Fuck. He dumps the machine on the floor and stares at the wall for a long moment. A break would probably do him good.

He’s tried everything he can think of. He’s made a tracking spell using Bucky’s book and his moonstone. He’s called every Seer he can think of, hoping that perhaps they ~~can~~ could tell him where Bucky might be. None of them gave him a good answer, telling him that they couldn’t look into Bucky’s present or future—that something was blocking their view. Steve also talked to Bucky’s friends—the ones that he hung out with in Hell’s Kitchen—Karen, Matt, and Foggy. But none of them knew anything. He hadn’t spoken to them for a while—not since before he lost his arm.

All of Steve’s leads are hitting walls. He’s getting frustrated and impatient; he’s on the verge of a mental breakdown.  

There’s a knock on the door that startles him. He sits up slowly and carefully steps over the shattered laptop on the floor.

He picks up his gun—the one that he’s kept tucked under his pillow—and walks to the door, holding the weapon in his left hand while reaching for the knob with his right. He opens the door and hides his left shoulder behind it, effectively shielding the gun from sight.

“What?” His guest stares at him. “You gonna let me in or what?”

Steve sighs and scratches the back of his head with the hand holding the gun. He steps aside and lets Natasha in. She’s holding a greasy bag of fast food and a drink carrier.

“What a gentleman you are,” she says dryly. She glances around the room. “Nice place.”

She sets the bag on the bed and grabs her drink from the carrier. “I brought lunch,” she points out, quite unnecessarily. She kicks the door closed behind her.

Steve sets his gun back down on the table. “Why are you here?” he asks.

It comes out sharper than he meant. Nat raises an eyebrow at him. “Because I was worried about you.”

“Bull,” Steve says. “You knew I wanted to be left alone.”

She huffs at him. “Okay, fine. Yes, I knew you wanted to be left alone. Fury made me find you.”

“What gave me away?” he asks.

She smiles sardonically. “You’re here under the alias Roger Stevens. A _monkey_ would be able to point you out.”

Despite the situation, Steve cracks up a little. Yeah, the alias was a _little_ obvious.

“Fair enough,” he chuckles.

“I was still worried about you, though, Steve. I’m always worried about you.”

Steve smiles, warmed by the confession. He knows Nat has trouble with things like that—emotions.

“So,” he says. He takes the other soft drink from the drink carrier and takes a sip. “Fury looking for me? You going to turn me in?” He smiles a little. “Or are you going to help me find Bucky?”

Natasha tilts her head at him. “Are you giving me an ultimatum? What happens if I _do_ turn you in?”

Steve shrugs. In all honesty, he wouldn’t blame Nat if she took him away. She would just be following orders. He would still put up a fight, though.

“I don’t know,” Steve says, sitting down on the bed. “I haven’t decided yet.”

She smiles a little at him. “Make it easy on me, Rogers.”

Steve stands from the bed and turns away before she can break his resolve.

“Why don’t you just go to SHIELD, Steve?” she asks him. “This is a little much for one person to take on. I know you’re talented, but really. Why?”

He sighs. “ _Because_ , Nat,” he says. “They would take me off the case because of my personal tie to it, firstly, and secondly—SHIELD is a government-owned investigative bureau, and I don’t want to have to jump through a thousand hoops just to take a step forward. I want to do this my way.” Steve would love the help in finding Bucky, but he doesn’t want to be ensnared by Fury’s rules. Or _anyone_ else’s, for that matter.

She takes a loud slurp of her soft drink. “I can respect that,” she says with an impressed nod of her head. “But I think you should answer Fury anyway.”

He just stares at her before looking down at his hands.

“He just wants to see you,” she informs him.

A heavy feeling settles into his stomach. He wants to chew Steve out, of course. First about the security breach, and then about the radio silence. His blatant dismissal of the Director is enough grounds for a suspension. Maybe even a demotion in his rank.

“He’s not happy,” she adds. The twist of her mouth tells him that the situation is perhaps direr than he originally thought.

Steve steels himself and says, “I don’t care.” He doesn’t have time for this. He needs to find a new laptop, right now. Maybe the hotel has a computer they can use.

A long silence. Nat fake-coughs loudly and says, “ _Anyway_ , Clint says he’s looking into it. He can get a lot farther than the two of us.”

Steve snorts. “Yeah, but people are going to know what he is when they see a huge hawk flying around in the middle of the city.” This was just one of the reasons why Steve was relieved when Bucky told him that his familiar form was a dog. No one would look twice at a supposedly stray dog roaming the city streets. Clint Barton, however, is a fucking buteo hawk. Not so common past the city limits. Hell, not so common in _the state of New York_.

Nat gives him a look. “You want to go after them yourself?” she asks, muffled through a bite of pizza. “Be my guest. I’m sure you’ll get far.”

Steve deflates. “Sorry,” he mumbles. “It’s just that I—”

He cuts himself off suddenly and his forehead wrinkles.

“It’s just… it’s…”

His chest hurts all of a sudden. It hurts so badly he knows that something isn’t right. It isn’t the dull ache of Bucky’s absent emotions—no. This is new. This is a blossoming fire in his heart, bright and painful.

“Steve? _Steve—_ ”

His ears are ringing, his palms spread against the carpet—when did he drop to the floor? Trying to understand what’s happened, he tries to clear his mind, but the pain is too present. It demands to be endured.

Emptiness. His chest has just been ripped open and his heart ripped out, leaving a gaping hole within him. His heart caught on fire and burned away. He can’t breathe from all the smoke. He can’t catch his breath—for the first time since the Serum, he can’t catch his breath.

+++

Dr. Banner is shining a light in his eyes. His vision fades in and out, focusing and blurring. He’s in a room that he wasn’t in before—he must have passed out.

Steve groans and blinks. The pain that was present before isn’t gone, but it’s dulled down to a steady, throbbing ache.

“He’s waking up,” Banner says, turning off the light and leaning away.

Natasha’s head comes into his vision. “Steve?”

Steve works to get his elbow underneath him and sit up, but the pain in his chest is nearly enough to make him pass out again. His vision, which had focused, suddenly blurs again.

“Easy,” Banner says.

Steve shoots him a look but takes his advice. He slowly sits up, clutching his chest with one hand. He rubs at the place over his heart. It feels like he’s just had a fucking heart attack.

“What happened?” Steve asks. “Did… was the Serum…”

“No,” Dr. Banner says. “The Serum is fine.”

Steve looks up and around the room. The place is small and the walls are a shocking white. He must be in the SHIELD hospital rooms. He never comes here, much to Bucky’s distaste. He knew how much Bucky pained to see Steve hurt. But, even though these rooms were always here for his use, he never used them.

Either way, the room is too small for the several people that inhabit it as of now. To his surprise, his friend Sam is there in the little hospital room with him, along with Natasha, and, of course, Dr. Banner.

“There weren’t any physical injuries,” Banner says, wringing his hands.

Steve’s eyebrows pull together. “What? Then how come—?”

“ _Physical_ injuries, Steve. Physical,” Sam says.

Steve stares hard at Sam, and then what he’s saying finally sinks in.

No physical injuries. As in, it wasn’t his flesh and bone that were injured. It was his soul that got hurt.

His breathing quickens, and the sound of the hospital machine increases. “No,” he says, shaking his head. He won’t believe it. “No…”

“I’m sorry, Steve.”

Bucky… broke the Bond with him? Why would he do that? The Bond was a way of finding Bucky, why would…

“I’ll give you a moment,” Banner says, and walks out of the room.

And then the realization washes over him. The Bond was broken because it was a means to finding each other. Or because Hydra wanted Steve wounded. Suddenly he’s alive again with the thrill of the chase, the thrill of being on a warm trail. If they did this, if they wanted to throw him off so badly, he might have been on the right track.

“So…” Nat looks at him with worried eyes. “That’s it, then? The search is over?”

Steve stares at her strangely. “What do you mean, the search is over?”

“Well, Steve.” She looks like she’s trying very hard not to be blunt, like she usually is. “Your Bond is broken. You know what that means, right?”

Steve tilts his head to the side, considering her. “You think he’s dead, don’t you?”

“You don’t?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Clint's familiar form - a ferruginous hawk (buteo regalis):  
>   
> 


	3. Moving Day (Pt. 1)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I changed a few things in the past few chapters so that the story I want will make sense. I tried really hard to leave things be, but my inner editor told me that I had to change it. If you want, read over the chapter "Wolf Spiders" in Salt. If that's going to be too time consuming, check the end notes for an explanation. :)
> 
> Also, so sorry for the long wait! I had a busy month, applying to colleges and dealing with midterms. However, I did get a headstart on a few other chapters that are coming up, so they should probably be up sooner than this one. Thank you all for being so patient while I iron out the kinks in this story (no pun intended :P ). Excuse the typos, please! And enjoy the chapter.

Natasha always manages to be his best friend and his greatest challenge all at once.

She is sweet and wise beyond her years, but her morals are a little loose for Steve’s liking and she’s as stubborn as he is when it comes to things like this.

Steve just stares at her, unable to find the words. How could Natasha, someone who is Bucky’s friend, accept this so quickly? The Bond was _broken_ , yeah, but that doesn’t mean that Bucky’s _dead_.

“No, I don’t think he’s dead,” Steve says, venom slipping into his voice. “How could you say that?”

Nat is surprised by Steve’s words and blinks at him. “I’m just trying to be realistic, Steve,” she says, eyebrows furrowing together.

Steve feels ice curling in his stomach. “You were his best friend,” he says. “He liked me, but he could share everything with you, all the things that he was afraid to tell me. You put him in line. You made him a better person. And you’re just willing to accept that he’s not around anymore?”

She presses her lips into a severe line. “You have _no_ idea what’s going on in my mind right now, Steve, so don’t pretend like you do.”

Steve stares at her for a long moment before he tears his eyes away. Natasha shifts on her feet, oblivious to the awkwardness of the moment. She rarely ever feels such emotions, it seems.

 

Nick Fury visits him in his hospital room. Steve is just getting ready to check out as the doctor already told him he could go. He changed out of the hospital robe, searched for his wallet when he couldn’t find it in his jeans and stuffed his car keys in his pocket.

Natasha had left a while ago after several minutes of dead silence. Steve had been trying to make his escape before Nick got the news and came to chew him out. However, just as he’s about to step out the door, the Director is blocking his exit.

Steve almost stumbles backwards with the suddenness of Nick’s appearance. He stares for a second in stunned silences before choking out, “Good afternoon, Director.”

The Director is a man of very, very few words, so he just informs Steve that he has a car waiting for him outside.

They make their way downstairs and Steve is too tired and wiped to care anymore. He wants to bolt out the doors and tear New York apart to find where Bucky might be hiding.

“Where are you sending me now?” Steve asks. His voice sounds dead and flat.

“Stark’s Tower,” Nick answers.

This surprises Steve a little, because the Tower is far from a secretive location. Everyone in New York knows what it is, and knows that Tony Stark owns it. It’s a little obvious for a safehouse.

“It’s the safest place for our most valued operatives,” Nick says, as if reading his mind. “It’s not discrete, but the security is better than any other place on earth. You’ll be safest there.”

Steve blinks away his surprise. “Will Tony be okay with that?”

This is something that isn’t of utmost importance, but it is true that Steve and Tony Stark haven’t always gotten along in the past. When they first met, really, they kind of hated each other. But they’re friends, now—even if it did take some time and work to achieve this.

“I would hope it’s okay with Stark,” Fury says, “considering he was the one who offered.”

Now Steve is very confused. Nick’s words pull him away from his preoccupation with the anxieties at hand and into the present.

“What?” he says.

Nick smirks at him—an occurrence that is extremely rare; Nick’s primary two expressions shift between an angry frown and an even angrier frown.

“Ms. Potts will help you get settled,” he says. The car stops and Steve realizes that they’re waiting in front of the Tower. Pepper Potts is making her way out of the front doors and walking over to the car, a big smile on her face when she meets Steve’s eyes.

He climbs out of the car and shuts the door. Just before he turns and makes his way to Pepper, Fury rolls down the window and says, “All your things are here. The stuff from your brownstone and the bag from your hotel. All here.”

Steve gives him a tight smile before giving a small, polite salute.

The Director drives off into the bumbling New York traffic without another word. Steve turns to find Pepper is right there next to him.

“Shall we?” Steve asks, a tired smile spreading on his face. He offers her his arm, which she takes with her own, locking elbows.

“Nice to see you, Captain,” she says, a bright smile spreading across her face. “I heard Fury saddled you with us. We were expecting you a little sooner, though.”

Steve smiles at her. Pepper has always been the sweetest person. It’s the only way that she’d ever be able to stand dating someone as intense as Tony.

She guides him over to an elevator and pushes the button to go up. Once inside, she says, “Take us up to Steve’s floor, please, JARVIS.”

“My pleasure, Miss Potts,” a disembodied voice intones. JARVIS is Tony’s AI—the perfect butler.

The elevator starts its way upwards and Pepper doesn’t try to make small talk, which Steve is grateful for. He’s not sure he would know how to reply.

The elevator stop for a moment, the door opening to reveal Tony Stark himself, wearing a suit and tie, his sunglasses tucked into the neckline of his shirt.

“Captain,” he says, a smile spreading on his face. Steve can’t help but feel like he’s being a little sarcastic.

“To what do we owe the pleasure?” he continues, and now Steve knows that he’s _definitely_ being sarcastic.

Pepper rolls her eyes and fixes a hand on her hip. “Don’t be an ass, Tony.”

Tony pouts a little at her but steps inside the elevator anyway. He automatically wraps an arm around Pepper’s waist as the doors close. The elevator starts moving upwards again.

Tony starts talking, filling the silence with questions that he answers by himself, while also texting someone on his phone. He doesn’t really seem to expect a reply from Steve, which is somewhat comforting, since Steve knows he can tune him out.

Soon enough, though, the elevator stops. The doors open with a pleasant _ding_.

“Your quarters, Captain Rogers,” JARVIS says.

Steve steps out and the breath is nearly taken right out of him. Tony mentioned that he gets a whole floor to himself. Which, considering the surface area, is pretty sizable. His brownstone in Brooklyn was big, but this—this is kind of ridiculous.

The floor sprawls out in front of him, with a ceiling surprisingly high for a floor that isn’t the penthouse. There are a plethora of rooms to lounge in, he learns—

“There are two guest rooms, one master bedroom, a kitchen, a dining room… am I missing anything?” she asks, turning to Tony. The man just shrugs as he continues texting on his phone. “Oh! An art studio.”

“Really?” Steve asks, pleasantly surprised by the gesture.

“Yeah,” Pepper says, grinning at him. “Tony tells me you’re quite an artist.”

Steve blushes and looks at his shoes. “Well, I wouldn’t say that—”

Tony rolls his eyes, puts a hand on Steve’s shoulder, and says, “Don’t listen to him, Pepper. He’s great, he’s just too shy to admit it.” He pats Steve’s shoulder a little roughly and says, “Want someone to help you unpack?”

“I think I’m good,” Steve says. “I’ll just get myself settled in.”

 

There aren’t that many boxes to go through. Tony’s given him new furniture and the furniture at the brownstone will probably be sold or shipped off to another safehouse.

He’s been forced to move a lot in the past eight years since taking his job at SHIELD, so all the things that he thought he couldn’t live without, he’s found how damning it is to be sentimental and how easy it is to survive without little trinkets and pictures weighing you down.

So he doesn’t have many boxes. Or pictures.

Every picture he needs is in his wallet. One of his mother, Sarah, smiling primly up at the camera. It’s the oldest photo he has in his wallet, and it’s wrinkled and a little torn, but it’s the only one he has of her. And then he has a picture of him with Sam and Natasha, Sam in the middle with his arms around Nat’s and Steve’s shoulders. One of Peggy holding a glass of champagne, sitting at a table in a restaurant. Steve took that picture the night they got engaged.

Well, he has _almost_ every picture he needs. None of Clint. None of Bucky.

The elevator dings and Steve perks up, turning to see who it is. When the doors open, he’s surprised to see Natasha making her way over. He shuts his wallet and quickly shoves it back into his pocket.

“Pepper told me you were getting settled in,” she says, sauntering over.

Steve’s mouth twists. Natasha doesn’t really seem to have a permanent home, but she does have her own floor in the Tower, and when she’s not working, she does tend to spend her time with Pepper Potts.

Steve turns back to his boxes, deciding to be civil. “I was surprised Tony even wanted to offer me a floor,” he replies.

Nat smiles a little and says, “He does like you, Steve. Even if he’s too emotionally constipated to tell you.” Her lip quirks up even further. “He’s worried about you.”

“Well,” Steve says. “Can’t say I’m not impressed with the way he shows it.”

Natasha smiles and plops herself down on the couch. Steve puts a box of his things next to her.

“I could use a hand,” he says, smiling wryly at her.

She gives him the most scandalized, downright _betrayed_ look.

He snorts. “Okay, I’ll do it myself then.”

Doesn’t really matter how he finishes it, as long as it gets finished. He just needs to get this done so he can find Bucky. Eventually, though, Natasha decides to help him.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I changed the name of Hydra the company to Strike. Strike is run by Hydra officials but is just not called Hydra. 
> 
> I've also made it so that Steve/SHIELD knows very little about Hydra other than that they are Bad People™ who do Bad Things™. It's discussed later on that they've never been able to get any Hydra agents to talk before they end up committing suicide while in their custody, so they never get much information on Hydra itself, their cause, or their other affiliations.


	4. Paperclip

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey kids. I just found out these past two months that it's difficult to write from Steve's perspective! So that's why I've decided that I'm going to sprinkle in some of Bucky's perspective after all. We should probably find out what he's up to! But that will come later, chapter six. It's gonna be great, guys. And by "great," I mean "upsetting."
> 
> Meanwhile, I'm doing NaNoWriMo. I chose to do THIS work even though I've already started it because I wanted to push myself to write it, but seriously. It's more difficult that I thought it would be. I've only ever done summer sessions of NaNo because that was when I actually had time to write, so this is my first year doing real NaNo and I'm going to explode.
> 
> But anyway. I hope you guys enjoy this chapter. It's a little longer than usual but I figured you guys wouldn't mind. ;)

The most upsetting thing to Steve is that they know Hydra is an extremely dangerous group of people, but their intelligence on their motives is incredibly limited. The agents that they brought in for questioning from Steve’s home still refuse to break. No matter the time spent waiting, the number of questions asked, or whichever scare tactic they use, they remain silent.

There are six of them. Three men and three women. Day and night, there are people questioning them. Not one of them has said a word. It’s honestly the first time SHIELD has managed to grab hold of any Hydra agents without them taking a cyanide pill and offing themselves.

“Which is a _win_ ,” Natasha says pointedly.

“Yeah,” Steve says, though he’s not sure he agrees. At least if they were dead there would be a reason for them not opening their mouths.

+++

Sam, in the end, decides to help him in his search for Bucky.

Sam has always been a good friend to Steve. They knew each other when they were young and it seems like they have been friends forever.

When they were on missions, Sam would listen to Steve whine about Bucky for hours. When they would be locked together in a plane for half a day or so, Sam would patiently listen to Steve’s qualms about Bucky, how scared he was that he would screw something up, how scared he was that he couldn’t protect Bucky forever.

“I want to meet him,” Sam said, the first time Steve brought Bucky up in conversation.

Steve snorted. “Why?” he asked.

Sam smiled, his bright white teeth contrasting against his dark skin. “Because of the way you’re talking about him,” he said. “The last time I saw you get like this was with Peggy. But even then, you weren’t _this_ bad.”

Steve had blushed and punched Sam on the shoulder, but he was still right. The way he feels about Bucky, he’s never felt towards another person before.

He had dated a few people in high school, but when he started dating Peggy, they all paled in comparison. He loved Peggy. He really did. They’d known each other since they were kids, grew up together. They started dating their senior year of high school and they were together almost all of college. The day Steve proposed and she said yes was the happiest he’d ever felt. He hadn’t even had enough money to buy her a ring.

They were engaged for three months when Peggy called it off. Well—he likes to think that it was more of a mutual understanding. They both felt like the relationship had met its end. Steve wasn’t angry with her, and there were no harsh feelings—it had just… fizzled out. They loved each other, but they were not passionate for each other.

There will always be a special place in Steve’s heart for Peggy. She referred him for a job at SHIELD when Sarah had died—Peg was a probationary agent, but the Director liked her, and he trusted her and when he saw that Steve had received Erskine's serum, the deal was done. 

Bucky is different. He loves Bucky endlessly, has loved him since the moment he saw him in the bar down South. He loves Bucky enough that he gave him his soul. And even when the Bond broke, Steve still knows that Bucky was worth the pain. He knows Bucky is still worth the pain.

 

That’s how they find themselves in the SHIELD archives, late at night, compiling everything they know on Hydra. Sam works on the physical files while Steve looks on the computers for anything, _anything_ they might find out about them.

He jots down notes every so often with questions or tidbits of information. Wondering who their leader is, how big their ranks are, what their origin is. He has way more questions than answers.

Sam comes back after an hour and a half of searching and dumps a few files on his desk. The pile is decidedly small—it consists of ten, maybe fifteen files, at the most.  

“This is all we have?” he asks. He grabs a file from the top and opens it. There are only a few pages.

Sam rubs his neck and groans. “Don’t even get me started,” he says. “I went through everything, Steve. These guys seriously don’t want to be found.”

“This… this doesn’t make sense,” Steve says. He grabs a few of the other files and opens them.

Sam goes off to his desk and Steve opens up a folder. He might as well start reading.

The first document he looks at is an intercepted letter from World War II. On the top half of the paper is the coded version of the letter, while right below is the decoded version. Steve skips the coded version altogether.

\---

DEC 19 1938

Dr. Zola,

I have heard of your pioneering work in the scientific community. I would like to offer you a job working for the National Socialist Party. I think your talents could be put to great use here, and your influence would be greatly appreciated.

Sincerely,

Johann Schmidt

\---

Steve puts the letter down and moves on towards the rest of the papers in the folder. There are profiles on both men mentioned in the letter—Johann Schmidt and Dr. Arnim Zola.

\---

_NAME: Johann Schmidt_

_BIRTHPLACE: Germany_  

 _DATE OF BIRTH: Jan 15, 1914_  

_KNOWN ALIASES: Dell Rusk, Bettman P. Lyles, Cyrus Fenton, Tod March, Aleksander Lukin_

_BACKGROUND: Not much known about early life. Given to an orphanage at a young age, and spent teenage years bouncing from job to job. As an adult, he was a devoted member of the Nazi Party in Germany during the Second World War. Confidant to Adolf Hitler and Nazi general officer, he is believed to be the founding member of Hydra._

_CONFIRMED DEAD: May 8, 1945_

_\---_

He bites his lip and sets it aside, looking at the photo that came with the file—a square-jawed man with close-cropped blond hair and a cold, calculated gaze—for just a second before picking up Arnim Zola’s file. The picture shows a short, bald man with circular glasses and a deeply-lined face, wearing a red bowtie.

His file is even more scarce than Schmidt’s, not even showing a confirmed death date. All that Steve is able to gather is that Zola was one of the first biochemists and genetic engineers of his time, who spent his life working for the Nazis on top secret projects.

He’s not sure how Zola fits into Hydra, but the idea of a high-ranking Nazi enlisting a renowned biochemist makes his stomach churn.

There are other files—mission reports that are redacted and basically unreadable, which he tosses aside in frustration. Soon he’s made it through almost all the files and decides to look at the newest info they’ve acquired: the pictures of uniforms from the agents in their custody—all black with a red Hydra symbol embroidered into their shoulder—as well as list of things that were hidden in the many pockets of their uniforms. Which included several knives, extra bullets, and one cyanide pill each.

Steve looks at the insignia that was stitched into their clothing. Something clicks within him, and suddenly he is frantically searching his computer. When he finds what he’s looking for, he stares for a long time before deciding that he’s not crazy.

“Sam,” Steve calls, swallowing the lump in his throat. “Look at this.”

Sam goes and looks over Steve’s shoulder, fixing his eyes to the computer screen.

“What about it?” he asks.

Steve holds up the Hydra insignia next to the logo for Strike. They look remarkably similar.

“So they look alike,” Sam says. “What’s your point?”

“They don’t just _look alike_ , Sam, they’re almost the same thing.” He looks up at Sam with meaningful eyes, but Sam just stares back with wariness. “Look, I know it sounds crazy. But think about it—what do you know about Strike?”

Sam shrugs. “It started getting really popular, like five or six years ago. When it came out with new phones and tablets and shit.”

“Do we have a file on Strike?”

Sam shrugs and goes to search. “This isn’t a lot to go on, Steve. Could be wishful thinking?”

Steve doesn’t answer as Sam goes and looks through a few cabinets before finding a file on Strike, which is far more substantial than the other files that are currently on Steve’s desk. Sam returns with the file, sets it on the tabletop, and flips it open.

Sam reads, “‘Strike started as a scientific research group in the 1930s…’ Shit.”

“What?” Steve asks, perking up. He sits a little straighter in his chair. “What’s wrong?”

He runs a fingertip over the words printed on the page. “I think you’re right, Steve,” Sam says quietly.

“What does it say?” Steve repeats.

Sam takes a breath and says, “‘Strike started as a scientific research group in the 1930s, specializing in biochemistry research and weapons development.’” He looks up at Steve with sheepish and worried eyes.

A hard lump forms in Steve’s throat. “And where was it… where was it started?”

“Switzerland.”

He nods to himself and says, “What else?”

“It says that Strike halted weapons development after World War II after seeing the damages caused by the US on V-J Day.” He flips a page over, and then another, and then another. “There’s more, but it’s redacted.”

A cold hand grips Steve’s heart. “We need to go to Fury,” he says suddenly, getting up hastily from his chair. “We need clearance to see that.”

“Steve, I don’t know if this is such a good idea anymore.” Sam tucks his hands in his pockets.

“Sam, if those things are secret operations or monetary records, we need to know if there’s something fucked up about it. We need to know if they’re hiding something.”

“Well,” Sam says, sighing, “we _do_ have six Hydra agents in custody.”

Steve gives him a flat look. “And they’ve said about five words, collectively.”

Sam shrugs. “You wanted help, I’m giving you help. Take it or leave it.”

He thinks it over for a few seconds. Hydra agents are always difficult to break, but maybe it’s worth a shot. “Alright,” Steve says. “Talk to Fury and clear us for interrogation. And if you get the chance, see if he’ll tell you about those files, alright?”

“Gotcha,” Sam says.

Steve stares at the files on his desk before starting to gather them and put them in their correct folders. He hesitates to put them back in their cabinets, and then quickly decides to keep them. He tucks them into his work bag to take back to the Tower later.

 

Fury clears them for interrogation but informs them both that he’s skeptic if any of the agents will say anything.

As Sam and Steve are leaving Fury’s spacious office, Fury puts a hand on Steve’s shoulder.

“Could I speak with you for a little longer?” he asks. Steve nods and glances at Sam, who takes that as his cue to leave.

“I’ll get the Hydra agents ready for interrogation,” he says, and exits.

Fury closes the door that Sam has left open.

“I assume you have questions,” Fury says.

Steve nods. “Sir,” he says, “I was looking through all the files we have on Hydra, which isn’t a lot, I know. But, look—”

He explains all the things that they’ve found—the similar logos, the redacted reports on Strike, its history. When Steve’s done, Fury purses his lips.

“That’s barely anything to go on, Rogers, and you know it,” Fury says pointedly.

Steve’s shoulders slump. “I… I don’t know what to do,” he admits. “I know that there’s some sort of connection, but I—I don’t—”

Fury holds up a hand. “You didn’t let me finish,” he says.

Steve’s mouth snaps shut as he waits for Fury to continue.

“It’s barely anything to go on, but I may be able to fill in a few blanks.” He strolls over to his desk and grabs a few papers off its top. He hands them to Steve, who muses over them briefly before saying, “What are these?”

“Those are monetary reports from Strike,” Fury says. “If you look at them and review them carefully, you’ll find that they’re missing more than two hundred million dollars in spending.”

Steve’s eyes go wide. “Two _hundred million_?”

“Which is small,” Fury says, “considering they’re a multi-billion dollar industry, but still. Two hundred million dollars missing. Any idea what that could be going towards?”

Steve nods and folds up the records quickly. “Thank you, sir,” he says hastily, and then rushes out of the office.

He makes it down to interrogation, where another SHIELD agent is leading a Hydra member into the interrogation room. A woman, the first of the six people that they’ll be interviewing. It’s been a little while since they tried getting info, and the woman looks a little annoyed. Steve quickly shows the records to Sam outside the room. Sam just nods and presses his lips tightly together before they both push into the room.

Sam is going to be doing most of the question-asking while Steve stands behind him. He relaxes against the one-way window and crosses his arms while they go through their questions.

The woman doesn’t answer a single question. And the next person they bring in—a man, this time—doesn’t answer anything either. By the fourth person they bring in, Sam is exhausted, so Steve decides to take his place while Sam takes up Steve’s previous position. Steve still has the records that Fury gave him in his hand. He grips the papers tightly as their next suspect sits down at the table.

The man sitting in front of him has short, salt and pepper hair. Tanned skin, getting paler from his time in custody, deep lines etched around his mouth and the beginnings to crow’s feet around his eyes. He looks more like a tired father than a Hydra agent.

He stops staring and asks him a question.

“What do you know about the organization you work for?” Steve asks, keeping his tone neutral.

The agent doesn’t answer. Just shifts a little in his seat.

“Anything important we need to know about? Any plans that you’re working towards?”

Again, the agent doesn’t answer.

Steve presses his lips together and takes a deep breath through his nose.

“What do you know about Johann Schmidt?”

At the name, the agent looks up, his eyes a little panicked before schooling his expression into a neutral one. Steve wants to smile but manages to hold back.

“Do you look up to him? He was the founder of Hydra, yes?”

The agent just looks back down. Steve bites his lip and decides to do something. He pushes forward the records—records of Strike’s missing money—flips open the folder.

“What is Hydra’s affiliation with Strike?” Steve asks.

That makes the agent look up again. After a very long silence, the man just laughs cruelly, shaking his head. “Oh…” he says, through a harsh chuckle. “You are children. You have no idea what you’re getting into.”

“He can speak,” Sam mutters admonishingly.

But the words are just a cover-up. Steve looks over to Sam, who seems to be thinking the same thing he is: _that wasn’t a “no.”_

+++

Steve leaves the interrogation room in a rush, a half-formed thought in his head.

They weren’t able to get anything of substance out of the agents, but there’s a half-formed thought in Steve’s head. He thinks about the missing money, the affiliation with Strike, and he wants to crawl into a hole but also wants to run out into the world screaming his head off.

Sam tells him to take it easy. He has a bad feeling in his stomach, though, and he’s afraid he’s not going to get any sleep whatsoever.

Eventually, though, Sam forces him to go back to the Tower and doesn’t take no for an answer. So Steve packs up his things and leaves SHIELD HQ and takes a taxi back to the Tower.

 

He sits on the couch and stares at the ceiling for a long time. Against all the odds, Steve finally manages to drift off to sleep.

And when he dreams, it is more a vision than a dream.


	5. The Castle

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Extra-long chapter up ahead! Next chapter we move on to Bucky's POV for a short while. :)

In his vision, he’s watching himself from above, fighting the Hydra agents off as more seem to pour in from the windows. They’re like ants, in all black, scuttling down the walls of his house to try to pick him to the bone.

He turns away from his own fighting figure and moves down the hall. His body is like a ghost’s—as he walks, he doesn’t feel his feet hit the floor, and he seems to be totally invisible to the other people around him.

He spots Bucky just down the hall, catches him just as he turns into his familiar form. Steve goes to shout, but no sound comes out of his mouth. He rushes towards the group of agents that take Bucky by his hind legs. He struggles, but even the strength of his familiar form isn’t enough to overpower the many agents around him.

Another man grabs him by the scruff of his neck, another one grabs both of his front legs, even though they probably know by now that one of them doesn’t work properly. The three men take him towards the white van. Bucky changes back into his human form, and the men stumble for a second, but it’s not enough. Another agent comes up and she zip-ties his hands and feet, and then they shove him in the back of the van.

Then the agents quickly pile into the front seats and speed off, north.

North.

_North—_

 

He jerks awake as a horrible feeling unfolds in the pit of his stomach. He has an idea. Before he can lose the idea, he grabs his phone from off the coffee table and runs to his bedroom to grab the StarkPad that Tony insisted on giving him when he moved in.

Sam answers on the second ring.

“Yeah, Steve?” he asks, his voice thick with sleep. He must have woken him.

“I have an idea,” he says. He taps on the StarkPad, opening up the maps application and typing in his old address.

“Yeah?” he says again. He can feel Sam slipping back into sleep so he says, a little louder, “Yeah, Sam. I have a hunch.”

“And what is this hunch?” he asks.

Steve finishes typing in his old address and searches for the closest Strike facility—factory, office building, whatever turns up. There’s a Strike facility past Albany, a three hour drive from Steve’s old home. _North_ of Steve’s old home.

“I think they took Bucky to a Strike factory,” he says. “There’s a manufacturing facility about a half hour from my old brownstone. It could be a front for a Hydra facility.”

Dead silence at the other end of the line.

“Are you sure about this?” Sam says eventually. He sounds much more awake now.

Steve nods, even though he knows Sam can’ see him. “Yes,” he says. “I’m positive.”

“And you want to storm in there and rescue him?” he asks.

“Yes,” Steve repeats.

Sam sniffles. “Talk to Fury and we’ll figure the rest of this out tomorrow, okay? We have to smooth out a lot of kinks before we actually do anything, okay?”

Steve takes a deep breath and lets it out slowly through pursed lips. “Okay, Sam. Thank you.”

+++

He barely gets any sleep that night. He can’t help but think about battle strategies, about getting in and getting Bucky and getting out. It’s not just a job for one man, but he knows that if Sam says no to helping him that he’ll do it himself. He needs to know that Bucky is okay. He needs to find him.

He knows in the pit of his stomach that he’s right, that Bucky is where he thinks he is. But he doesn’t know how to convince other people—Sam, Nat, Fury, anyone—that he’s right. He doesn’t know how to get them to trust them just based on the fact that he has a gut instinct telling him so.

There’s the issue of him sounding deranged and obsessed when it comes to this. People need to know he’s in his right mind. So he takes a deep breath and turns over on his bed, trying to fall asleep. No one is going to want to listen to a guy that looks like a garbage can chewed him up and spit him out.

He gets about three hours of sleep, which is about three hours more than he was expecting. He wakes early the next morning, showers for a long time. The vision left him with an empty feeling in his stomach. Some witches get a few visions during their lifetime, and Steve never really expected to get one. Most people think that only Seers get visions, but the only ones that think that are the ones that have never gotten visions. Truly, it’s an experience that you can’t describe until it’s happened to you.

He’s pretty positive that that’s the first and last vision he’ll ever get.

The hot water of the shower patters against his skin, so hard it almost stings him. For a long time he just stands there, head down, watching the water drain. Then he starts scrubbing his skin so hard that he’s bright pink all over when he finally steps out of the shower. He feels raw and tender as a newborn child, pink with the loss of his skin. He still doesn’t feel clean.

He gets dressed for work anyway. He has too many drawers and not many clothes to fill them. He’s sure Tony will try to remedy that, if he ever finds out.

Steve leaves a little early, making sure that everything he needs is in his bag. He has the files that he took from work yesterday, and today he packed the StarkPad because he’s sure that he may need to whip it out at some point or another. He’s also trying to mentally formulate a reason to ask Fury if he can try to infiltrate the Strike factory, but so far he hasn’t gotten any bright ideas.

He stops for coffee before going to work, because he didn’t make any at the Tower, and suddenly he’s hit with an image:

_A half-finished pot of coffee, still brewing, sitting on a granite countertop. Sitting at a breakfast bar, staring at the newspaper. Looking up as he hears the stairs creak and Bucky makes his way down, hair mussed from sleep, padding down on the hardwood floors, stiff and awkward in his movements. So tired, and grumpy, but utterly adorable. His feet make little flop flop flop noises as he makes his way through the hallway and into the kitchen._

_“Coffee?” he asks, his voice rough from disuse._

Steve wants to cry.

It’s been a month since Bucky was taken. Two weeks since the Bond was broken. He hasn’t felt Bucky for two weeks. He’s been completely alone for two weeks, and he’s going fucking mad.

Taking a deep breath, he sets his drink in the cupholder of his car and turns the keys in the ignition. He doesn’t have time for a breakdown. He has work to do.

He arrives at SHIELD just on time even though he left early. He tries to calm himself down, tells himself that everything is going to be fine and Sam will help him take care of this, but he sort of wishes that he didn’t need someone’s help to handle this. He knows that Sam is happy to support him, but he used to have more credibility to his name. He used to be more respected. Since Bucky was taken, everyone around him seems to walk on eggshells. They doubt his ability to make decisions. They assume automatically that he’s going to act rashly and without thought.

Steve can’t possibly explain to them what he’s feeling. They’ve never given their soul to someone only to wake up one day and have it severed. They don’t know how impossibly empty it feels to be just himself within his own body. He used to have someone else in his heart, and now… there’s an abyss. A hole that can only be filled by one thing: the person who left it there.

He loves Bucky so much, loved him enough to Bond with him. And people are so eager to move on from it all, call it a day, say it was an accident, claim his death, ready his grave. But if there’s even a chance that Bucky is still alive and willing to to go back with Steve, Steve will take that chance. He will gladly take that chance.

He sits down at his desk and sets his paper coffee cup off to the side while he takes all the things out of his bag. The Hydra files, the StarkPad, his notebook where he was jotting down his thoughts while reading the papers. He sits there for a long moment, unsure of what to do next. Does he try to find Sam? Usually he would be here by now. Or does he go straight to Fury and ask him if he can assemble a team for this mission?

Before he can make up his mind, he sees Natasha walking over to his desk, an unreadable expression on her face.

She gets to his desk and plants her hands on the edge of it.

“I hear you’re going to try to storm a Strike factory,” she says.

Steve doesn’t know where she’s going with this. “Yeah, if Fury will let me,” he says, leaning back into his chair, trying to put a little distance between them.

She leans down and settles on her elbows, bringing herself to his eyelevel.

“He already approved it this morning,” she says. Her mouth twists strangely, and Steve can’t tell if she’s trying to hold back a smile or a frown. “Sam went in and made a case for you. He trusts your judgement, Steve. He’s one of the few humans who won’t discredit witches just based on what you are.”

Biting his lip, he says, “Sam or Fury?”

Natasha smiles a little. “Both,” she says.

That makes Steve feel, of all things, honored. Grateful, even. Fury may be a man of few words. He may be a hard-ass and incredibly dry in his speech. But he sees the potential in the people he hires. He knows what he’s doing.

And Sam, well. If there’s anything he can say about Sam, it’s that he’s the best man he’s ever known. There’s a glowing energy inside of him that influences any person that he comes into contact with. If Steve didn’t know that Sam was completely human, he would suspect that Sam put some sort of enchantment on him.

The man in question enters the office just a second later, dressed in a sweatshirt and athletic shorts.

“On your way to the gym?” Steve asks, leaning back in his chair. Natasha straighten up and hops on top of Steve’s desk, her legs swinging just a little.

“No,” Sam says. He looks up at Steve, and suddenly he notices the way his eyes are lined with weariness. “Just didn’t really feel like trying today.”

Nat smiles at him and pats his shoulder as he passes.

“I didn’t keep you up all night, did I?” Steve asks worriedly.

“No,” Sam says. Then he pauses. “Well, I was thinking about what you said, but that’s not why I was awake.” He sighs. “I was awake because I have a shit tone of Strike technology at my house and I was awake all night trying to see if any of it was bugged. I pulled apart my damn laptop, my TV… just paranoid. I threw it all away.”

Steve understands. He was a little worried, too, before he remembered that Tony would be mortified that Steve owned any technology by anyone other than StarkTech.

“Nat told me that you went to Fury,” he says.

Sam nods, collapsing into the chair on the other side of Steve’s desk. “Yeah. He just said that we need to get a team together. We don’t have a floorplan of the building, which will make things a bit difficult, but… it’s your call, Cap.”

Steve nods to himself and looks up at Natasha, who is now sitting cross-legged on top of his desk. “I know you don’t think I’m right,” Steve says to her, “but it would be great if you went on this mission with us. You’re more of a spy than the two of us. Plus,” he adds, grinning, “you’re more likely to fit into small places than we are.”

Her eyes sparkle with humor. “I know this is important to you,” Nat says, a little smile on her face. “I’m here if you need me.”

He smiles at her and then says, “Is Barton available? Or Peggy?” They could use as many familiars as they could get, honestly. Barton was especially valuable, since he could give the bird’s-eye view of the place.

“Clint is, Peggy is not. She went deep undercover earlier last week,” she explains.

Considering, he says, “Okay. We can do this with four, right? Nat, could you get Barton? We need to start a plan.”

+++

Getting a good plan takes a surprisingly short amount of time—about a day and a half. Strategy has always been Steve’s area of expertise, but with minimal knowledge of the facility, most of the plan is actually “wing it.”

They’re grabbing gear in a locker room, just about to leave. Sam is putting on extra padding, and Steve is strapping on a holster for a gun when Sam looks up at him.

“You gotta be careful with this, man,” he says.

Steve flashes him a smile. “I’m always careful.”

Sam huffs a laugh. Silence for a second.

“Seriously, though, Steve,” Sam says. He shuts his locker and Steve looks up. His eyes are full of concern. “Bucky isn’t here to patch you up this time. You’re gonna have to actually be careful. You’re no good to him if you bleed out.”

Steve looks at him for a second before dropping his gaze, focusing on pulling the zipper up on his bulletproof vest. “Yeah,” he mutters. “Yeah, I know.”

He looks up, plastering a smile on his face. “But we’re gonna get him back, soon,” he says, giddy at the idea. Bucky will be back with him soon.

Sam grins with him and claps him on the shoulder. “Yeah, man. We’re getting him back real soon.”

+++

The drive there would take around three or four hours, so Steve decides to take a helicopter rather than a car, because they need to get out of there quickly, and a car can’t won’t be able to do that sufficiently.

It’s a little cramped in the helicopter, but only Sam complains. Clint starts to complain but Nat smacks him on the back of the head, which shuts him up quickly.

They land about a half mile away from the facility, after dark, and walk from there. Well, Clint flies, and the rest of them walk.

The plan is that Clint will give them an aerial view of the place, let them know how many guards they’re dealing with outside, and Nat will make a distraction while Sam and Steve slip inside. Ideally, Nat will find a way inside after them, and Clint will go back to the helicopter to be their getaway driver. If there’s room on the roof, that’s where he lands.

When they’re about a tenth of a mile away, Clint flies over the facility, counting the guards and making sure there’s room on top of the roof to land. He gets back a mere five minutes later, transforming into his human form immediately and stumbling to the ground.

“How many?” Steve asks.

Clint brushes off the front of his clothes with both hands, scratches near the bandage covering the bridge of his nose.

“Not that many, surprisingly. Fifteen, maybe? Five in front, five on the roof. A couple on the back entrances. They might decrease security at night, but I’m sure it’s going to be hell on the inside. Key code to get inside is seven-nine-eight-four-three. No ID badges required or thumbprint recognition.” He beams at them when he finishes.

Steve nods and claps him on the shoulder. “Good job, Barton,” he says.

Nat, Steve, and Sam go forward while Barton doubles back for the helicopter.

They’re utterly silent the rest of the way there, only stopping to duck behind some shrubbery. Nat smiles slyly and walks away from them, going about fifty feet away before pulling out her gun.

Steve hears her fire a single shot. He watches the guards as they perk up. When Natasha fires another shot, all five of them take off running towards the sound.

Once the coast is clear, Sam and Steve run towards the exits and quickly punch in the code that Clint told them.

The second they step inside, the lights go out.

“Fuck,” Sam curses. “They know we’re here.”

Red emergency lights kick in a moment later. Steve knew that this all seemed too easy, he just _knew_ it. He doesn’t see any security, but something tells him that there’s something much worse going on.

“We have to go quickly,” Steve says. They’re probably evacuating the building, which means that if they were holding Bucky in a cell of some sort, which is highly likely, that he’ll be escorted away somewhere else shortly. But they have to move.

Steve holds his gun up, ready to shoot, and starts leading the way. He peeks around corners, and when he sees nothing, he moves on down the hallway. The lighting is incredibly eerie, and Steve’s heart rate is through the fucking roof, but he can’t stop now to catch his breath.

They go up a floor without seeing anyone. Steve is starting to think that maybe, somehow, they knew he was coming.

He got one thing right, though—this place is definitely Hydra. All over the place, the logo is flashed in their faces. The name is plastered onto any bare wall, stamped onto the files that they see lying abandoned on desks.

Steve walks first into a room that has a large window, viewing over a balcony. Straight ahead is a large Hydra symbol painted on the wall. The walls of the room are all covered in red scribbles. There is one cot and a toilet, but other than that, nothing.

“He was here,” Steve breathes.

All over the white walls and on the floor, there are drawings. Steve can barely believe his eyes—drawings of Steve’s face, of the brownstone, of sigils and directions for novice-level potions. The lighting makes it difficult to see well, but Steve sees it all clearly. Bucky was here, in this cell. He wants to cry with relief.

“We’ve got company,” Sam says to him. Immediately, Steve is turned around, facing the door, gun raised and ready to shoot.

A Hydra worker walks into the room and is surprised by Steve’s and Sam’s presence. He startles and puts his hands up.

“Who are you?” he barks at them. “What are you doing here?”

“Where did you take him?” Steve growls back.

“Take—what are you talking about?”

“James Barnes,” Steve clarifies. “What did you do with him?”

The worker looks annoyed and angry. He lowers his arms. “Are you an idiot?” the worker says. Sneers. “Barnes is dead. He died two weeks ago.”

Steve’s breath leaves his body in one final exhale.

“What?” he manages.

“Barnes is _dead_ ,” he repeats. “We wanted him for information but he wouldn’t cooperate.” The man laughs a little. “Shocked him a little too hard in interrogation. His heart stopped, Rogers. You’re too late.”

He never told the man his name. He looks over to Sam, who seems to be thinking the same thing.

“You’re lying,” Steve says weakly.

The man scoffs and shakes his head. “You won’t find him here,” he says. “James Barnes is dead. He told us some interesting things before he died, though.”

Steve swallows. “Like what?” he asks, taking a small step forward.

The man twists his lips up in a cruel smile. “Like you were Bonded to him,” he says. His eyes dance with cruel humor. “The good Captain settled down, huh? How does it feel to be incomplete? To have a hole in your heart that you just can’t fill?”

Steve’s hands shake.

“We’re gonna blow this thing wide open, buddy,” Sam says. His eyes and voice are both hard as steel.

“You won’t have proof, my friend,” the man says. He takes out a button from his pocket. Steve’s stomach drops. It’s a detonator.

“No,” Sam says, inching closer.

The man pushes the button, and Steve just barely registers what’s happening before the man is pulling a gun out of the holster from his belt. He shoots, catching Sam square in the chest.

The bulletproof vest stops the bullet, even at such close range, but Sam yelps in pain, and Steve can imagine that his ribs are broken. Then the man puts the gun to his own head and pulls the trigger. Steve grabs Sam and pulls him out of the room, stepping over the body as they go.

The building suddenly shakes. A bomb. The bomb has gone off, and Clint is supposed to be on the roof, and Nat—he doesn’t even know where Nat is.

“Nat,” he breathes into the comm. “I need you.”

“What’s the situation?” she asks, slipping into all-business mode.

“Sam is hurt,” he says. “We saw an agent and he pulled out a detonator and shot Sam close range. The building’s gonna be on fire in fifteen minutes.”

“What floor are you on?” she asks.

Steve has to think for a second. “Seven,” he says.

She takes a second before saying, “The helicopter is on the roof, level fourteen. Think you can get there in time?”

He honestly doesn’t know. Sam is slow moving, trying to get air into his lungs. Every breath aches coming in.

Steve can already spot a fire coming through one of the doors the level below them, from the balcony. He turns to Sam and says, “Climb on my back.”

Sam does so, with difficulty.

Sam isn’t light, but this will be much quicker—Steve has a spell in the helicopter that can help mend the bones, they just need to get _out of here_.

Taking off for the stairs, Sam grunts in pain as Steve jostles around. The elevators will be no good. He just hopes the smoke hasn’t reached the stairwells yet.

The stairs are difficult on Sam. He clutches Steve’s shoulders so tight, he knows there will be bruises there soon. But Steve just powers on. Floor eight. Floor nine.

Steve almost loses his footing on a stair and he stumbles, barely catching himself. Sam is getting so heavy. Floor ten. Floor eleven. Floor twelve.

Just two more floor and he can get to the roof. Sam is starting to slip, and Steve can smell the smoke. The fire has reached the stairwells, and the smoke is rising fast.

Floor thirteen.

He reaches the door to get to the roof and lets Sam slip from his back. The man does so and stumbles, catching himself on the wall. He’s sweating, and Steve is too. Panting hard. Not just from the climb, but the smoke is making it challenging to breathe.

He tries for the door. It’s locked.

Panicking would do no good. He pulls on the door again, but it’s very sturdy. There’s no keypad to unlock it, just a key. He has nothing to pick the locks with.

Taking a deep breath, Steve kicks it three times, and still nothing. Finally, he takes his gun and shoots the keyhole once, twice, three times. The lock busts, and Steve pulls the door open. He grabs Sam and pulls him with him.

Natasha isn’t on the roof yet, but he spots a Russian grey cat climbing the side of the building when he goes to look over the edge of the roof. Her familiar form. She climbs up in less than a minute.

The helicopter makes it difficult to hear, and the propellers stir up the smoke more than they clear it. Steve, Nat, and Sam all climb into the helicopter, and Steve grabs the first aid kit for Sam.

It’s only when they’re in the air that Steve stops to think about the mission. If Bucky wasn’t dead before, he’s not sure how he could have survived the bomb or the fire.

They ride home in pure silence. Sam sleeps in his seat, the potion making him tired so he can recuperate.

He’s been deluding himself. Bucky’s dead. He’s gone. Steve would be either selfish or stupid to think otherwise, after the fiasco at the Hydra base.

He’s never going to see Bucky again, he realizes. He’s never going to see Bucky again, or talk to him, or tell Bucky he loves him. He’s never going to be able to tell Bucky how beautiful he is. He’s never going to make love to him again. He’s never going to kiss him again.

But what hurts the most is knowing that Bucky died having thought that Steve was going to save him but didn’t. Bucky died without Steve present. Bucky died at the hands of evil, disgusting people. People that Steve had said he would protect Bucky from. Bucky died, and it’s Steve’s fault.

Bucky died knowing that Steve _lied_ to him, before Steve got the chance to fix it. And now it’s too late. It will never be fixed. It will always be an unsolved problem, a predicament, an eternal falsehood in Steve’s eyes.

 

Natasha walks Steve to his room. He just wants to break down, and the silence is killing him. When the elevators open to his room, he stalks inside without saying a word to her.

He claws at his scalp before angrily swinging at whatever he can touch. His fist collides with a music speaker that was on his counter and it falls to the floor in pieces.

He feels a hand on his shoulder. He hadn’t realized Natasha walked in with him. He turns around to face her, tears stinging his eyes.

“You were right,” Steve mutters. “About him being dead. You were right. Happy now?”

Natasha looks on the verge of tears as she says, “No.”

That’s not the response Steve was expecting. Truthfully, he wasn’t sure what kind of response he was expecting, but the single word Natasha said has broken his heart into a million pieces. He forgot how much Natasha loved Bucky. Loves him still. He was important to her. Perhaps they didn’t know each other long, but he was thrown into her life and they got along like a house on fire. Steve lost his love, yes, but Natasha lost someone important to her, too.

He would do anything to have Bucky back right now. Anything.

He breaks down completely then, turning his head down towards the floor and letting the sobs rip through his body. He opens his arms, and Natasha rushes into them. They’re both so strong and too proud, but they can’t hold it together like this. They both deserve to cry. It’s been a long, long night.


	6. Moving Day (Pt. 2)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Now we get to see Bucky's point of view! Be wary of the tags, because all that shitty stuff that Hydra does is about to come into play right here. :|

######  **THE SOLDIER**

Sleep is nice. It’s a pleasure that they grant him, and he knows he ought to be thankful. Which he is, really. He ought to be thankful that they allow him to sleep at all. He knows they can be crueler to him.

Sometimes they put him in the freezing spell—Rumlow, not Pierce, because Pierce detests magic—and it keeps him awake for days and days. He can’t sleep under the spell. He’s just…aware. For endless, endless hours.

He knows they could be crueler to him.

Sometimes, though, he feels resentful. He wants the contact, the friendliness that is passed between his handlers. They don’t give him that same treatment. His dead arm takes the brunt of many jokes, and his quiet demeanor brings more teasing upon him. His silence is taken as submissiveness, which—well. To them, he’s an easy target. A kicked puppy who doesn’t bite back.

But, the sleep is nice. His bed is slightly softer than the concrete and he has no blanket, but the places he goes when he’s asleep are beautiful. He looks forward to the times where he’s allowed to be asleep. Most days, he gets six whole hours.

Today is different, though.

“Get up,” a voice barks at him.

The words snap him from his slumber. His dream dissipates before he can grab a hold of it as the world around him reappears.

The regular lights are out, replaced by a steady red glow.

The Soldier slowly pushes his arm underneath himself and hoists himself from his bed. It’s a difficult task. His muscles burn with the movement. They made him run, yesterday, until he collapsed and vomited. Today was supposed to be his rest day. It seems that this has changed now.

He does not get the luxury is waking up slowly. They have a schedule to keep, and his handler—Rumlow, the one who woke him—is extra-hardened today. He looks like he, too, did not have much sleep. He is in a rumpled shirt and the jeans he was wearing earlier today. He doesn’t have his usual holster around his belt, but he does carry a handgun.

Rumlow grabs him by his working arm and leads him out the open door of his room.

“Where…?” the Soldier asks. He stumbles along groggily.

“Change of plans,” Rumlow says. He holds the gun across the Soldier’s chest, as if afraid he’s going to make a run for it. “We’re taking you to the Red Room early. Gonna fix you up real good.”

The Soldier swallows the lump in his throat. He can’t tell whether to be apprehensive or excited. His handlers have talked about taking him to the Red Room for weeks now, but he always looked at it as something that is far-off, a monument in the future that he will never see up close.

They leave the building after passing through several security checks. There seem to be a lot of people running around, even this late at night—it makes him wonder what the issue is, if something is wrong and they’re not telling him.

He doesn’t get the time to dwell on it. They put him in a helicopter and strap him into a seat. Buckles criss-cross over his chest, and straps hold down his arms—even the one that doesn’t work.

It’s become increasingly weak over the past month or so. While he trains his working arm, his dead arm retains no muscle definition. It hangs by his side, the bone becoming more prominent every day. Mr. Pierce told him weeks ago that they were working on a solution to fix it, but the Soldier has long since stopped asking when that day will come. Rumlow doesn’t like it when he asks.

 

From the helicopter, they put him on a spacious private jet. He looks out the window and sees the world as it becomes smaller and smaller as it takes off. He wonders vaguely where they’re going—they seem to be going farther east. They never once told him the location of the Red Room. For some reason, he assumed that it was closer than it actually seems to be.

He stands from his seat after a while, walking around the cabin to stretch his legs. He shakes out his arm, bounces on the balls of his feet. Then he sits back down and tries to keep away the jitteriness that comes with being in small, enclosed spaces.

He changes into his familiar form for a short while, curling up on the seat, taking up as little space as possible. They are on the jet plane for so long that he falls asleep. He jerks awake when he realizes that his consciousness is slipping away, but Rumlow doesn’t seem to be angry.

“Might as well catch a few hours,” Rumlow says when he sees the Soldier yawn.

Uneasily, the Soldier settles into his chair. His adrenaline rush slowly ebbs out and he falls asleep, dreaming of absolutely nothing.

 

He wakes up smelling food.

He groggily sits up in his chair—he seemed to have change back into his human form in his sleep—to see Rumlow eating a plate of food his handlers never give him: turkey, peas, carrots, mashed potatoes, and a roll of sweet bread.

His mouth waters at the sight and looks up to see Rumlow staring at him. He’s had nothing to eat for several weeks but meal replacements. He wants real food. His stomach growls as if on cue.

Rumlow laughs. “Hungry? You want some?”

The Solder hesitates, not sure if he’s being serious, and then nods minutely.

“Please,” he says softly.

Rumlow calls an attendant to bring back food for him. The Soldier feels a little rush of excitement.

He’s wanted for a very long time to eat _real_ food—something other than the protein- and vitamin-enriched meal replacement bars that he’s given. He hates them so much, he gagged when he first had to eat them. They taste like old pennies and sea water.

When the attendant comes out, the Soldier sits up in his chair to receive his meal. His eyes are wide with hopefulness, but when he sees her take out a large bar wrapped in white paper, his stomach falls to his shoes. The little light of hope in his chest flickers out.

He looks at Rumlow, hoping he’s just kidding, but he seems to be dead serious.

“What?” Rumlow asks. He sneers at the Soldier as he stuffs the sweet roll in his mouth. “You shouldn’t have assumed.”

The Soldier stares at the meal-replacement bar, his appetite suddenly gone. He tucks his knees against his chest and wraps his good arm around his legs.

“That’s all the food you’re getting, you know,” Rumlow says, his mouth full of food. The Soldier doesn’t answer. Just opens his window shade and watches the world below him.

“You need your strength,” Rumlow says, but the Solder barely hears him.

Rumlow sighs. “Don’t be such a bitch about it,” he snaps. “It was just a joke. Don’t take it so hard.”

The Soldier remains silent. They treat him worse than a dog. At least dogs actually get treats once in awhile.

Rumlow finally leaves him alone when he doesn’t answer, turning forward with a huff.

It’s his fault, really. He shouldn’t have gotten his hopes up. He’s well aware of how Rumlow likes to treat him. He should have expected no reprieve.

The flight takes, overall, ten or eleven hours. The Soldier is starting to get antsy when an attendant comes in and tells them that they’re going to be landing soon and to buckle themselves in. The Soldier struggles to put on his seatbelt with one hand, while Rumlow looks on and offers no help. He chuckles a little when the Soldier drops the buckle for the third time.

“Better hurry up,” he taunts. “We’re gonna be landing soon.”

On the fifth try, he finally does it, just before they start their descent.

He doesn’t like airplanes, he decides. They make him feel trapped. The way that this giant metal bird soars just right above the clouds—some people may find it enchanting, but the Soldier finds it unnatural.

When they finally come to a stop, Rumlow leaves before him to assess the area and scope for danger while the Soldier stays inside the cabin.

He stands up, stretches his legs, and looks around. He seems to be by himself. He’s reluctant to leave the airplane, even though he didn’t like it. He has no idea what’s waiting for him outside the door, and it makes him nervous.

The attendant emerges from the front kf the plane, looking shy. The Soldier lets her approach, watching warily. She comes close to him, holding a sweet roll in her palm. She hands it daintily to him.

He takes a step back and narrows his eyes at her.

“Is this a trick?” he asks.

Her eyes look scared and pained. She shakes her head and glances quickly over her shoulder. She takes his palm gently and puts the roll in its center. “He’ll be back soon,” is all she says before she retreats into front of the plane.

He stares at the roll for a second before looking at the place where she disappeared.

He eats it in three bites. The roll is a _little_ dry, but it tastes better than anything he’s ever eaten. The sweetness lingers on his tongue even when the only things left are a few crumbs. For the first time in a while, he is not hungry. He feels amazing.

He quickly wipes the crumbs from his hand, face, and shirt.He doesn’t want Rumlow to find out that he’s gone and done something he doesn’t approve of.

He takes a deep breath and picks up the meal replacement bar that he had pushed away earlier and sticks it in his pocket. He will save it for later. Maybe now it will go down a little easier.

Rumlow comes in shortly after and tells him that the perimeter is clear and that they can get going.

 

It’s below freezing outside. There’s a car waiting for them outside the plane, so the Soldier doesn’t need to be in the cold for too long before they’re getting into a warm space.

He sits in the back while Rumlow sits in front with the driver. The drive is a long one, it feels like—especially after such a long flight. The Soldier falls asleep in the backseat, briefly, before the jostling of the car wakes him.

They’re pulling into a garage on a snowy street. For a moment, the Soldier is confused about his surroundings. But as he slips more into consciousness, he remembers what happened earlier today. Yesterday. Whatever.

Two guards meet the Soldier by the door of the car. He steps out, and immediately, hands are circling his arms as if afraid he’ll try to escape. He makes no effort to, and they walk him inside the building. The Red Room.

He stews over the idea that Rumlow would need even a little security on him. Hasn’t he proved himself loyal? Hasn’t he taken every order, done everything he asked? Doesn’t he deserve trust, or at least a reward? The only person that has dared to treat him with anything other than blunt distaste was the woman on the plane.

There seems to be only two levels in the building, but what strikes the Soldier the most is how much red there actually is in the Red Room. The walls slathered a deep shade, like a garnet stone.

Garnet.

Something twitches in his brain, aching to be remembered. It’s just at the tip of his tongue before it becomes lost again.

“You’re the first one here,” Rumlow says. “Your new teammates will show up later this week. We wanted to fit you with your arm before they arrived.”

He doesn’t ask, and Rumlow doesn’t elaborate. He guesses he’ll find out who his companions are when they arrive.

Rumlow takes the Soldier to the middle of the floor. There’s a huge window in front of him, letting in blinding white late-winter light. “We have an enchantment,” Rumlow says. “A binding spell for your arm. We derived it from an already-existing spell and tested it so make sure that it doesn’t kill you.”

“Why can’t you do it?” the Soldier says, voice dripping with acid. He knows Rumlow can handle magic, even as a human. But mostly he’s just angry at Rumlow for teasing him on the jet earlier, for not trusting him to walk the four yards it took to get into the building without security.

There’s the briefest moment of silence before Rumlow slaps him hard across the face. The Soldier grunts at the contact and raises his good hand to cradle his cheek.

“Don’t speak to me like that, ever,” Rumlow snaps. “If I give you an order, you’re expected to follow it. Understand?”

The Soldier glares up at him and sets his jaw. “Fuck you,” he snarls.

Rumlow’s face flares. His eyes bulge out of his head, his skin grows a vivid red, and a vein in his neck makes itself known. The Soldier watches as his handler digs into the pocket of his jeans and grabs a switchblade.

He tries to back away when he sees the switchblade, but Rumlow takes a handful of the Soldier’s hair and grips tightly. Rumlow works his jaw open and, with the same hand, holds the blade to his chin. The Soldier struggles, but his handler’s grip on his skull is inhumanly tight.

“If you can’t say anything nice, I’ll just have to cut out your tongue,” Rumlow growls. The Soldier panics and struggles a little more. Rumlow’s grip on his skin becomes bruising, and it almost makes him whimper.

“Is that what you want?” Rumlow taunts. “You want your tongue cut out? You want to be even more useless than you already are?”

When he doesn’t answer, just struggles a little more, Rumlow shoves him away. His scalp stings—he must have pulled out a few strands of his hair. The Soldier breathes heavily, trying to slow his frantic heartbeat.

“That’s what I thought,” he sneers. “Now make the fucking potion.”

 

The Soldier gets to work in a room designated for potion-making, on the first floor. He takes the book that Rumlow gave him and turns to the bookmarked page. He notices several things have been crossed out and rewritten by hand. The sight makes his stomach flip.

 _This can’t be safe,_ he thinks.

+++

## REPAIR

###  _for broken or damaged things in need of a more permanent solution._

##### MATERIALS NEEDED

  * 5 parts metal—any non-radioactive metal is acceptable.
  * 3 parts alcohol (isopropyl alcohol recommended, but not required, for best effect)
  * ~~1 part water~~
  * ~~1 part iron flakes~~
  * ~~1 part salt (pink Himalayan salt ** _NOT_** recommended)~~


  *    _1 part blood from the intended user_



##### DIRECTIONS

      I.     Set the metal in your cauldron. You will _not_ need to melt the metal using high temperatures.  
      II.    Pour a third of the alcohol over your metal and light the fire beneath your cauldron. Stir.  
      III.   If your intent is strong, your magic should have melted the metal by now. While continuing to stir, pour the rest of the alcohol into your metal mixture.  
      ~~IV.   Add in the water slowly, mixing the entire time. Let simmer for three minutes.~~  
      ~~V.    In a separate bowl, mix the iron flakes and salt. After simmering for three minutes, pour the salt mix into your cauldron. Stir for several seconds and take off of heat. Your mixture should be the color of the metal you used. If a different color, you did something horribly wrong.~~  
      ~~VI.   Pour mixture over whatever is broken/in need of a repair. It should work like new!~~  
  
_IV. Using a sharp blade, cut across the palm of your non-dominant hand. Let yourself bleed above the cauldron for several seconds, no more than half a minute. Stir your solution for a minute and thirty seconds._  
  
_V. Remove your cauldron from the fire. If the solution has turned black, you have failed. If it remains melted and shiny, you have succeeded._  
  
_VI. Pour your solution over what you need repaired. You may also submerge the item you need fixed directly into the cauldron. It will work again like new. It will work better, stronger, more efficiently than ever before._

+++

The Soldier has a strange feeling within his stomach as he follows all the instructions perfectly. The metal melts at the bottom of the cauldron, and the alcohol doesn’t even evaporate.

There’s a ceremonial blade among his ingredients. With a sick feeling in his stomach, he cuts across his left hand and holds it above the cauldron with his good hand.

When he takes the cauldron off of the fire, his mixture is the color of the metal he was provided. Iron, he thinks. Rumlow didn’t tell him. 

He lowers his bad hand gently into the cauldron and into the metal solution, held up by his working arm. The liquid metal travels slowly up his arm, a silver tide rolling up his skin. It encases his entire arm and part of his shoulder, feeling much like lowering into a warm bath.

Soon the liquid metal stops spreading. When the Soldier touches it, it ripples like water.

But, even more. When the Soldier touches it, he can _feel_ it.

Feeling pins and needles, his arm seems to be coming out of hibernation.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> [Visit me on Tumblr for Marvel, Steve/Bucky and too many posts about Sebastian Stan!](http://cutepeggy.tumblr.com/) For posts relating to the story, go [here.](http://cutepeggy.tumblr.com/tagged/siw)


	7. Bitter Cold

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey kids, beware of the tags that I've added. If you're worried about the contents of this chapter, check the endnotes for warnings.

His new metal arm makes him nervous. He touches each of his fingers to his thumb, one by one, over and over, as if it will stop working at any moment. It never does.

But the magic within the hand is strange, and he’s not entirely sure that the arm is safe. His own blood is within this thing, but it seems to have a mind of its own, as if it is only _allowing_ his control over it.

A noise from behind startles him. He turns to find one of his bunkmates settling on his bed.

His roommate offers him a smile. “Hello,” he says.

The man—well, _boy_ , because he could hardly be any older than nineteen—speaks Russian and broken English. But he knows enough that he can communicate with the Soldier. The boy is truly the only sane person among the other recruits for the Wolf Spider Program.

The Soldier just smiles back and returns to staring at his hand. He notices how his face reflects in the liquid metal, which is almost amusing.

They have no names—just numbers. There are twelve of them, so they were numbered off between one and twelve. The Soldier is Three. His friend is Seven.

Seven climbs into the bed opposite of his. There are six beds per room, and the Soldier’s is the one right next to the window, in the corner. It gets cold at night because of the Red Room’s terrible heating system, but he can’t bring himself to care when he has such a fantastic view of the sky.

The Soldier looks back at his arm. It’s getting better, stronger. At first, he was so weak with that arm that he could barely make a proper fist. But after several weeks of using it again, and fighting with it regularly, it’s become much stronger. More than just a dead weight.

Training with the other Wolf Spiders has really been somewhat of a treat the past few weeks. They all get along well. They help him with the Russian, one of the boys even formulating a spell that will help him learn the language faster. Most of them also speak English, and it’s nice to be able to talk to someone other than Rumlow.

However, fighting with them has not been easy. Many of them are very strong and well-trained, years of fighting under their belts—and the Soldier only has a month’s or so experience from the Hydra facility, and he couldn’t even use his arm for any of that.

He seems to be a natural fighter, though. He’s not sure where these instincts came from, but… he knows how to throw a punch. He can dodge easily, he knows strategy that the other Wolf Spiders just don’t get yet. He’s skilled with a knife and a gun, not to mention his fists.

There are the Wolf Spiders, though, and then there’s Seven. The Soldier doesn’t understand why they chose this boy to be part of the program that they’re a part of—the Wolf Spider Program. Seven is not particularly muscular, more wiry. His arms hang by his sides, thin as two toothpicks and just as strong. His mop of pale blond hair hangs from his head in dirty tufts, and his face constantly has a few smudges—giving him the impression that he just woke up in a garbage heap. He can’t possibly fathom what they saw in the boy when they chose him.

That is, he can’t fathom it until he sees Seven in his familiar form—a peregrine falcon, is what he said. It's honestly one of the most majestic creatures the Soldier has seen. With his wings spread, he’s about a meter long. Four sharp talons on each foot. 

Not to mention, when the Soldier sees him working out, he’s one of the fastest runners the Soldier’s ever laid eyes on. He runs laps around the track like it's nothing, barely breaking a sweat as he goes around and around. But the Soldier is a little perturbed by how well he handles a gun.

He sees this boy, nineteen years old, his blue eyes are bright and happy when he jokes around with the other Wolf Spiders, but then when he gets behind a rifle, he changes. He doesn’t look nineteen, anymore—he looks timeless. Those bright eyes lose their light. They stare ahead without comprehending, black and dull as slate.

 

Two months pass.

The air grows colder, brisker. It starts to snow in torrents. Blizzards for days at a time. In the safety of the Red Room, the Soldier excels in his training. Hand-to-hand combat is easy, and he wins most of his spars. Shooting comes naturally to him—there are only two others that are better than him. But what he likes most is the potions and spells training. That’s where he truly is unparalleled. He may not be the best yet, but he learns so quickly and perfects his products so easily, it’s no doubt that soon he expects he will be the best out of the twelve of the Wolf Spiders.

Survival training is another area he excels in. The only thing he seems to have problems with are group missions. He hates them, can’t stand working with the other Wolf Spiders. He likes them well enough, and they all get along well—they have to, considering that they all live together and see no other people but each other every single day—but he would rather work by himself. Or, if he has to work with anyone, he would rather just work with Seven.

It’s early December when Rumlow seems to think that the Wolf Spiders are ready for their first real mission.

Seven speaks to him in rapid-fire Russian when he gets excited. When he gets a perfect bulls-eye in the shooting range or training ends early. That morning, when Rumlow talks about the mission, he’s dead silent. His pale blond hair falls into his eyes and he makes no move to brush his bangs back. His eyes stare forward. The Soldier thinks he sees anger in them. Or maybe that’s just ambition.

“The mission is simple,” Rumlow says. “Your job is to infiltrate a government laboratory and report back what you find on their current experiments.”

The lab is a secret one, located inside of a hollowed-out mountain. It’s made to last a nuclear war, to outlive many generations. Its security is through the roof, and nearly impossible to find in the snow without guidance.

The Wolf Spiders all nod. They pack what they need—heavy winter clothes, a few tents, guns, grenades, ingredients for simple spells, spellbooks, food. They each have a backpack full of the things they need.

It’s a long drive to where they’re going, he thinks. They take two vans to their destination. There are two Hydra agents up front and the rest of the Wolf Spiders sit in the back seats. The Soldier sits in the second row, right behind the driver—Rumlow. The others are quiet almost the entire time, just staring out the windows of the van as they near their destination. They’ve been in the car for hours and hours, now. The Wolf Spiders are starting to shift in their seats, getting antsy after staying in such a small space for so long.

The Soldier carefully watches the fuel gauge. They’ve gone just over two hundred miles when the van carrying the other half of the Wolf Spiders stops in front of them. Rumlow slams on the breaks as well and looks behind him, at the Wolf Spiders.

“Get out,” Rumlow says.

The Soldier looks around him, sees the outside world. There are no mountains around them, certainly no base for them to infiltrate. The plain is flat, covered with snow.

He looks at Rumlow again, his gaze levelled. “There’s no mission, is there.” It’s not a question so much as an accusation.

Rumlow stares back, unwavering. “You’re getting out either way,” he says. “You can do it yourself, or you can let me dump you in the snow once I’m finished with you. Your choice.”

The Soldier sets his jaw. He could take Rumlow… probably. But he won’t.

He opens the door to the car.

“Good choice, Soldier,” Rumlow says as he climbs out. He grabs his bag before he gets out. The other Wolf Spiders are already out of the car.

The Soldier looks around.

“Where are your bags, guys?” Ten asks. The vans are already driving away, the men are starting to shake in the cold.

“Everyone left theirs in the back,” says Five. “Except for Four, Seven, Twelve, and Three.”

The Soldier’s stomach drops. He shoulders his bag a little tighter.

“What?” Ten says. “There’s only enough for _four people_?”

Four grabs his hair and shouts in frustration, “There’s only enough for four fucking people!?” He throws his bag to the ground. It hits the ground and sends up a large cloud of powdery snow.

“Hey, don’t!” One says, grabbing Four by the arm. “There might not be a lot, but we need that shit!”

“They’re trying to turn us against each other,” Seven says, putting his hand on the Soldier’s arm. “We can’t let them do that to us.”

“Well, then, how the fuck are we going to survive?” Eleven snaps. “Because I sure as fuck don’t like the sound of this.”

Seven looks at them. “We ration. They told us the mission was going to last two weeks, yes? Four people eating three meals a day for four weeks, that’s… three hundred and thirty six meal-replacement bars. That’s one meal for each of us, every single day. We won’t starve.”

“Yeah, but we’ll fucking freeze to death!” Eleven spits, pushing Seven by the shoulder.

“That’s enough,” the Soldier barks in Russian. The others stop what they’re doing and turn to him.

“He speaks,” Four says, condescending.

The Soldier gives him a look, and all the humor withers away from Four’s face. He just looks around at all of them and says, “Here’s the reality—we’re not _all_ going to survive.” They all start to yell and fight but the Soldier just yells, “Shut the fuck up!”

The Wolf Spiders quiet immediately.

“We’re not all going to survive,” the Soldier says after a moment. “That’s just the truth. But we’ll have a better chance of surviving if we work together on this. When we divide ourselves into teams, that’s when we lose our edge. All our heads, working together, is better than each of us working alone. Seven had a good idea, eating a meal replacement bar a day. Those things are fill to the brim with all the vitamins and protein you need. The rest of the time, we drink boiled water. Got it?”

There’s a chorus of _yes_ es and _fine_ s.

“We have a limited amount of supplies for spells. Anyone have a spellbook?”

He surveys their faces, and no one comes forward. He twists his mouth, considering their options.

“Okay,” he murmurs. “We’ll work from memory, then. Start setting up camp.”

Their tents protect against snow and cold weather, but the Soldier knows that it’s still going to be freezing during the night. They only have four tents and four sleeping bags for twelve fully grown men. They’re going to have to huddle close for warmth.

Most of them will die from dehydration, he thinks. They all have winter coats, hats, scarves, pants, boots—it’s about the only things that they _all_ have. Now they have to learn how to survive on one meal a day in extreme weather.

The biggest problem will be making a fire. They need a fire with no dry sticks or rocks to spark. The Soldier looks around and says, “Any of you know a fire spell?” He knows that that is one spell that does not require a sigil or any ingredients, just words. It’s more like a charm in that sense, has to be renewed periodically.  

Wearily, Seven stands up and says, “Me. I know how.”

The Soldier is starting to understand more and more why Seven was chosen for the Wolf Spider Program. Looking at him, no one would ever be able to guess that he could do much. He looks weak, his arms are thin, his chest is thin and birdlike. But he holds extreme power. People have always believed that someone’s familiar form is the accurate representation of their soul. Looking at Seven, he wholeheartedly agrees. He may look weak, but he’s a bird of prey. Strong, magnificent, powerful. Maybe he’s not strong in his human form. But his control over magic is unheard of in a familiar.

He holds out his hands, cupping them as if he’s using them to hold water. He bows his head and mutters a few words, and then blows gently into his hands through pursed lips. A fire sprouts in his palm, small and shy as a newly-grown flower reaching towards the sun.

The fire, obviously needing no wood to burn, is set down on the snowy ground. It’s not red or orange like a regular fire, but more yellow and white. It burns exceptionally hot.

Seven is, truth be told, probably more powerful than he is. His eyes are clear. His hair is so pale it’s almost white. He radiates power, and strangeness. Maybe they’re the same thing.

Seven was the best at spells and potions, though the Soldier did learn quickly. He was the best marksmen, the best at strategy. The Soldier is good, but he simply is not as good as Seven. If it weren’t for his physical strength, Seven could easily kill him.

The others set up the tents while Seven keeps the fire going. There are four tents, so they’ll have to cram three people inside each, but they probably could use the heat.

The Soldier melts as much water as he possibly can before he has Seven put out the fire. He drinks almost all of it, hands the rest to Seven, and they go to their tent.

 

Six is the first person to fall sick.

It’s three days in, and the cold doesn’t agree with him. He huddles close for warmth at night, and he sticks close to the fire during the day, and he eats—but still, the hypothermia creeps up on him.

The Soldier sleeps next to him at night, can hear his slow, shallow breaths. Unable to stand the sound for long, he goes and heats up water over Seven’s dying fire inside of his metal water bottle. Once it’s melted, just near the point of boiling, he brings it back into his tent.

“Sit up,” the Soldier says.

Six looks at him from under the sleeping bag, which has been unzipped so it can cover the three people in the tent—the Soldier, Six, and Seven.

He sits up slowly. He’s shivering even now.

“Drink this,” the Soldier says. “Slowly.”

“What is it?” Six asks, taking the water bottle.

“Hot water. It’ll raise your core temperature.”

Six looks at the bottle before giving it back, shaking his head slowly.

“I’m going to die either way, Three,” Six says. He folds his hands in his lap and looks at them. A frown twists his face. “I’ve scored the lowest out of all the Wolf Spiders in every category. Even if I survive this, I’ll never make it out in the real world, on a real mission.”

“Six…” the Soldier mutters. “Just drink the goddamn water.”

He shakes his head. “Just… let me. Please. I’m tired of this. That water will buy me another day, perhaps. But I’m not meant to last much longer.”

Seeing that Six is set on this, on this wish to die, the Soldier takes the water away.

“I don’t agree with you,” the Soldier says. “But I see how much you want it.”

“Thank you,” Six murmurs.

That night is a difficult one. The Soldier wants to make Six drink the water, wants him to live. Just before dawn breaks, he’s finally able to shut his eyes and sleep. He only gets a few hours in before someone is nudging him awake.

He rolls over and opens his eyes, looking up at the panicked face of Seven.

“What is it?” he asks, rubbing his eyes. He pulls on his hat to make it more secure around his head. They all sleep in nearly all their winter gear—wool socks, gloves, thick pants, warm hats.

Seven presses his mouth into a straight line. “It’s Six. He’s dead. We don’t know where to bury him.”

The Soldier sits up, his breath misting in the air. “The ground is fucking frozen. There’s nowhere _to_ bury him,” he mutters.

He sits up and grabs his winter coat, putting on a scarf around his neck and mouth. He quickly throws on his boots before making his way outside.

It’s gradual, but one by one, more and more Wolf Spiders start falling sick. Most of the day is spent sitting by the fire or trying to figure out what spells they can do with the ingredients they have, which isn’t a lot. When the next person falls sick—Two—he decides that instead of staying at camp, he’s going to walk as far as he can.

The Soldier tries to sway him, says that perhaps he can buy him more time, but Two is determined to not be a burden. He walks away just as the sun is going down, no backpack, no food, no tent. Just the clothes on his back.

Eleven is next. He does the same thing, except gives his coat to the camp.

It’s a week after his death that the Soldier starts noticing that everyone is a little sick, a little grayish. More so in One and Seven. This worries him, especially because the others, who have always harbored a little distaste for Seven, start treating him differently.

It’s midday. Middle of their second week out in the cold. The Soldier notices that Seven is falling asleep where he stands. The fire goes out when he closes his eyes. Trying to keep the fire going is draining him so badly, especially since he isn’t getting enough food. The Soldier sidles up next to him and puts a hand on his shoulder. Seven jerks awake and notices that he has no fire. He tries again to start one, but the fire just sputters out in his palms.

“W-what?” Seven says, confused. He tries the spell again, only to have the fire spark out again. “Oh, no…”

The Soldier takes him by the shoulders and starts to steer him into a tent, wanting him to go to sleep. But just before they get into the tent, Four steps into their path.

“He’s dying,” Four says. “He doesn’t come in if he’s sick.”

A rush of anger flows through the Soldier. He’s tried to be patient, but every decision that he’s tried to make in the last week and a half never goes unchallenged by Four. He wants to know why he has to share his tent, his food, his sleeping bag. He wants to keep the spare jacket to himself, wants to fight it out every time the Soldier tells him, no, he can’t have another portion while the other Wolf Spiders starve.

“I’m not leaving him,” the Soldier growls.

“Then you stay out here with him.”

The Soldier knows that it would be pointless to fight. Four is as stubborn as a fucking mule. A part of him wants to lash out and fight with him, but the Soldier knows that Four wouldn’t survive a fight. He can see the grayness in his skin, his eyes have dulled.

“Move to your own fucking tent, then,” the Soldier snaps. “This is my tent and I’m not leaving him.”

Four’s mouth drops open. “What? No. Just fucking leave him, Three! He’s going to die anyway, do you want to get sick, too?”

“Hypothermia isn’t contagious, you fucking idiot,” the Soldier says. He pushes Seven into his tent, watches him as he slowly climbs under the sleeping bag and curls up.

The Wolf Spiders snicker. Four turns around and stares them down, and they stop abruptly.

“Okay,” Four says, seeming to gather his courage. “Okay, fine. You want to run this shit? Well, I’m not sticking around to watch you kill all of us. I’m leaving. And I’m taking my food and my tent.”

The Soldier stares at him, a hard set to his jaw.

“What?” the Soldier asks harshly, raising an eyebrow.

“You heard me. We’ve been planning to leave for a while.” He looks towards his group—Five and Ten.

“Wow,” the Soldier says, sarcasm dripping from his tone. “You want to do that, go ahead. But it’s a ten days’ walk to any civilization, and that’s without the snow. And I’m not that much of an idiot to do that to myself.”

Four bares his teeth and pushes the Soldier back by the shoulder. “I’m the idiot? _You’re_ the fucking idiot!” he yells, pushing him again. “What happens when Hydra doesn’t come back, huh? What happens then?”

“What happens when they _do_ come back but you’re fifty fucking miles away?” the Soldier shoots back. “Or dead under four feet of snow? What happens then, Four?”

He pushes Four back, once, twice, until Four grabs his wrists with such force, it’s almost like he’s aiming to break them.

Nine steps between them, pushing them both back, and Four releases his wrists immediately. He turns, stuffing his hands in his pockets, and then says, “Let’s go, guys.”

Four, Ten, and Five all walk away in the same direction.

The Soldier shakes his head. “They don’t even know what direction they’re going,” he mutters. He looks at Nine worriedly. “They’re not gonna make it.” He sighs and looks at the rest of the group, which isn’t much: One, Seven, Eight, Nine, and Twelve.

“Anyone else want to join them?” he asks.

Not a single boy moves.

“Well,” the Soldier says, twisting his mouth. “With them gone, we have a lot more food to spare, at least.”

The group smiles a little as if he’s just told a joke, and then return to where the fire was going. They look at each other with heavy, worried glances. Without a fire, they aren’t going to last long.

He looks at his group, the men that have silently voted him as their leader. He doesn’t want to let them down.

“We have three tents,” he says. “We may only use two. Get warm. I’m… I’m not sure Seven can handle making the fire anymore. He’s too sick. Can you fit four people in a tent, or would any of you like to stay with Seven and me tonight?”

The four of them shake their heads. They seem to understand what is happening.

The Soldier returns to his tent to find Seven shaking violently. The Soldier crawls next to him and wraps arms around him, trying to warm his small body.

“You are a great friend,” Seven says.

The Soldier isn’t sure if he agrees. He’s not sure what his motivation is to protect this boy, but seeing him triggers an instinct so deep and ingrained that it’s almost physically painful to watch him die and know that he can’t do anything about it.

“It’s cold,” Seven says, and laughs. The Soldier isn’t sure if he has ever heard the boy laugh before. It’s weak and sounds like two rocks scraping together. Seven’s smile disappears in a second, though—his face relaxes, his eyes go glassy. A harsh shiver runs through him as he turns and looks the Soldier in the eye.

“Listen,” he says.

The Soldier nods.

“You have to survive,” he continues.

The Soldier places his flesh hand on the boy’s face. He won’t cry. He wouldn’t be able to afford the teasing of the others if he did.

“Survive and escape this place,” he says. “I remembered something today… something from my childhood.” He visibly swallows when he says, “Do you remember anything from your childhood?”

The Soldier blinks in surprise. He didn’t know what he was expecting him to say, but it wasn’t that.

“Of course,” the Soldier says. “Of course… I…” As he searches his head, though, he realizes that there is nothing to tell. He remembers things from the past few months, but before that? Nothing.

“I… I don’t know,” he says eventually. “But Rumlow—”

Seven just shakes his head. “Don’t listen to your handlers. They’re lying to you. All of them. They’re lying.” He barely has the strength to drag his eyes to the other Wolf Spiders. “They don’t know. They’re still loyal. They want to be their pets. But you’re stronger than they are.” He looks completely serious, even angry as he says, “It’s not about friendship anymore. It’s a competition. Whatever warmth we shared when we first got here, it’s gone now. Hydra wants us cold. They want us broken.”

The Soldier swallows the lump in his throat and nods shakily. He doesn’t know if he’s being serious, but—

But the boy seems to understand the sentiment. He smiles for a brief moment before the expression slips right off his face. He shakes so violently that the Soldier is almost afraid he is having a seizure.

“Stay here,” Seven says. “Until I… fall asleep.”

“Until you fall asleep,” the Soldier repeats, a promise.

They both know it, but dread to say it. Seven isn’t going to make it through the night.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Minor character death(s), hypothermia. Working title for this chapter was "general shittiness in mother russia."  
> Chapter inspired by a deleted scene from CA:CW where Nat talks about her experience in the Red Room:  
>  _“In Russia, in the Red Room, there were dozens of us. All girls, all young. We lived together. They let us be friends. Then they dropped us in the tundra, two weeks’ walk from home, with just enough supplies for one of us to survive.”_


	8. Red

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey pals! Sorry I missed last week's chapter. Finals have been killing me, but I'm on break now. I didn't fail any classes and I got accepted into college, so. Yay!  
> I also had a bout of writer's block, but I think that's mostly over now. If you don't hear from me in a month, though, you'll know why.  
> Next chapter, we go back to Steve's perspective!

He wakes up and his friend is dead.

The boy is still tucked in his arms, his eyes are closed—he must have passed in his sleep. 

He has to leave his friend. Burial isn’t an option in the Russian permafrost, but he makes a hole in the snow, covers him best as he can.

Without Seven to give them his fire, One dies the very next day. They all knew he was going to be next. The Soldier knew that they wouldn’t die from starvation—lack of food isn’t the problem. It’s the fact that they can barely stay warm enough to stay alive and that they can’t heat up water to drink. Eating snow is fine, but it lowers their body temperature and sets the hypothermia in faster.

He pays attention to his extremities. In the tent, he warms his toes with his hands. He barely takes off his gloves. He keeps his clothes dry. The remaining four of them start to live in the same tent.

At night, he can’t help but wonder what’s come of Four, Five, and Ten. Wonders if they’ve gotten far, or if they’re already dead.

 

They’re sitting in a circle in the tent. Their breath turns to mist in the air, and what really bothers the Soldier is the  _ smell _ . They all smell like shit. It’s been nearly a month in the cold and none of them have washed their clothes or showered in that long. He was fine the first few weeks, but the second that he noticed the smell, he couldn’t stop noticing it. Now it’s just another facet to their shitty lifestyle.

There’s a noise outside the tent that keeps getting louder. A dull roar. The Soldier hopes it’s not another storm, because he’s not sure if any of them would be able to survive that. None of them have the strength left.  They’ve all agreed to eat one and a half meal-replacement bars a day. Even though there’s only four of them left, their supply is dwindling. He worries what will happen when they run out of food, if Hydra will come and save them. Or if...

He can’t think.  The noise is growing steadily louder. It becomes so intense that the Soldier gets up from his spot and puts his boots on, deciding to check on whatever is making the sound. 

When he opens the zipper to the tent, the first thing he sees is the powdery snow blowing around and his heart drops. But when he makes his way completely out of the tent, he sees what’s going on.

It’s a helicopter.

It’s a _fucking_ helicopter. 

The other three follow him out of the tent to investigate with him, and immediately notice what he sees. They all start waving their arms like fucking madmen, yelling and screaming and jumping up and down, and he thinks that his heart is going to explode in his chest, because  _holy shit_. Hydra actually came back for them. There’s three of them left out of twelve, and Seven is dead, but he’s fucking _alive_ , and he’s going to do what Seven told him to. He’s going to survive and get the fuck out of here. 

The helicopter has already seen them and is starting to land. The four of them whoop and cheer and start running towards it as best as they can in their puffy clothing and weak bodies.

The Soldier doesn’t recognize the people flying the helicopter, but from their uniforms, he can tell that they’re Hydra. The two men driving the helicopter don’t smile, just tell them to put on their harnesses and get the fuck in. They give them headsets so they can talk to each other over the noise of the propeller.

“Where are the others?” the co-pilot asks.

He looks at all of them for an answer, but it’s the Soldier who speaks. 

“Three of them left to try to walk to safety,” the Soldier says. “The others are dead.”

The co-pilot nods and turns back around, facing forward. “And what are your numbers?”

Twelve answers for them, “I’m Twelve. He’s Eight, he’s Nine, and he is Three.”

“Three,” the man says, and then stops. The Soldier doesn’t ask him to continue. 

 

The return trip takes much less time than the journey there. When they step through the doors of the Red Room, the place looks as pristine as the day they let. The Soldier isn’t sure why he was expecting it to look different.

They trudge upstairs to their rooms. The smell from their bodies is a lot more obvious now that they’re home and not in some dirty tent. They strip and shower. For a long time, the Soldier looks at himself in the mirror. He’s lost weight. His hair falls around his head in limp, damp strands. When they return to their rooms, their winter clothes have been taken. Perhaps to be cleaned, perhaps to just be thrown away.

Once they’re dressed—the Soldier wears a simple pair of sweatpants and a t-shirt—they’re called to the main room.

Rumlow stands there in the center, and for a moment—a brief moment—the Soldier wants to run to him, to grab his throat and choke the life out of him. That man, that  _ motherfucker _ —he’s the reason he spent a fucking _month_ in a goddamn frozen wasteland. He’s the reason he lost so much weight, why he watched his teammates get sick and walk off in all directions to never be seen again. He’s the reason Seven is dead.

But he stops himself. He can’t let his emotions take the better of him. He needs to be strong and survive. He can comply with their wishes, pretend he’s the docile animal that they want him to be. And then he’s getting the fuck out of here.

He steps back, wipes the angry expression from his face. Maybe Rumlow is an asshole, but… he can be pretend for a little while longer.

Rumlow tells the four remaining boys that they have a Healer on the premises and that they need to visit the Healer one-on-one to assess the damage on their bodies. There’s a Seer there to check their past and report back their progress, to make sure that they withhold no information. They are to visit them both, going in ascending order. That means the Soldier is first.

He lets Rumlow lead him to the room where he will see the Healer and waits on a wooden table. 

The Healer enters a moment later, carrying a brown leather bag. He introduces himself as Dr. Faustus and tells the Soldier to strip down so he can do a full examination. He pokes and prods at his body, checking for broken bones or other injuries. Notices that there are blisters on his toes, a few on his hands. There are bruises on his stomach and legs that he can’t remember getting. He can see his ribs protruding from his skin in a butterfly pattern. His bones are knobbly, his skin is too pale.

“Malnutrition, most likely,” the Healer grunts. “Just eat three full meals a day and you should be fine. But I have something for those blisters. Frostbite?”

The Soldier nods. As much as he tried to avoid it, he was bound to get frostbite on a frozen tundra.

“Alright,” the Healer says. He reaches into his bag and pulls out a salve. 

There’s a moment in his brain when it feels like the gears are turning extra hard. Steam pours through his head, pistons fire… and he stares hard at the little glass jar. He remembers a cupboard, full of little glass jars, labelled with tape and marked with black permanent marker… 

The Healer pops the lid open, and the sound startles him so much he jerks. And then the moment is gone, completely forgotten, lost to the yawning black abyss of his mind.

He offers the jar to the Soldier. “Take some,” he says gruffly.

The Soldier dips his finger in and scoops out a little. The consistency is remarkably oily, like petroleum jelly. He makes a face as he spreads it over his other fingers and finally over the blisters. He feels a relief that he didn’t even know—he had just gotten so used to the pain it barely registered until it’s finally gone.

“I’ll send in the Seer,” the Healer says. “You just wait right here.”

The Soldier nods and watches as the man leaves before dressing again. He’s just sat back on top of the wooden table when a girl comes in, followed by Rumlow.

The Seer’s eyes widen when she first lays eyes on the Soldier.

“It’s… it…” she stammers. Her accent is thick, her cheekbones too defined, and her eyes are huge in her skull. Her hair is brown and flat, falling around her shoulders like old curtains. Rumlow tightens his grip on her shoulder, shakes her a little. He leans in to whisper in her ear, and she quiets immediately.

The Soldier stares blankly at her, unsure of her behavior. 

She walks over to him, caution in her every step. She takes his hand gently and turns over his palm to get a reading. Her knucklebones are sharp and protruding, but her touch is so gentle, like a caress, like a whisper of breath. She bites her lip and looks up at the Soldier, as if seeking permission. Confused, he nods, just enough, and she brings her other palm down to his and their skin collides. She squeezes his palm with her own, like a handshake. They barely touch for a second before she recoils with a wild gasp, snatching her hand away as if it’s burned her.

She bursts into tears.

The Soldier flinches and reaches towards her, as if to comfort her. Then he realizes he doesn’t know how to do that. He pulls his arms back to his body, nervous and unsure of her reaction.

“What did you see?” Rumlow demands.

The girl shakes her head and sobs, her hands covering her mouth. 

“What did you fucking _see_?” Rumlow shouts. When the girl still doesn’t answer, he turns and says, “You’re dismissed, Soldier.”

The Soldier gets up slowly as Rumlow grabs the girl by the elbow and pulls her back through the door where she came through.

 

He sleeps for two days straight. It’s like his body needs a chance to rebuild itself, to get used to the fact that it’s no longer in mortal peril. His bed is so soft compared to the hard, cold frozen tundra. It’s like sleeping on a cloud.

Surprisingly, his handlers  _ let _ him sleep. They say that the magic of the Healer has caused them to sleep so that they can recuperate properly, but he’s not sure he believes that. When he wakes up, he wonders why they haven’t called him into training, or to recount the mission. Perhaps they just knew that he was ready to crash. Eight, Nine, and Twelve all seem to be on the same boat as him—Nine wakes up nearly the same time as Three, but Eight sleeps for another day. Twelve doesn’t wake up until someone forces him to,  five days after the mission has ended.

Once they’ve had a week to recuperate, it’s back to training, which is even more rigorous and tiring than before. Or maybe they’re just out of practice.

They feed them and feed them, trying to get their strength back up. The Soldier sees he skin fill again with muscle and fat. The food has improved slightly; they give them more protein, which means actual meat, or even legumes and nuts, to build their muscle. Milk and cheese for calcium. Oranges to fight off infection, which are the Soldier’s favorite.

Rumlow calls them in after training, one by one, to report on their experience and match it to the Seer’s recount.

The Soldier doesn’t have much to say about the mission other than the fact that a lot of people died. Rumlow sends him out without much interrogation, so he’s surprised when he sees Alexander Pierce come in and ask to speak with him privately. Rumlow follows him, chin held high, actively looking for any mistakes being made.

With a lump in his throat and his stomach all that way down to his feet, the Soldier follows Pierce and Rumlow out of the room.

He takes him to an empty room where the wall is lined with mirrors and a balance bar is mounted to the wall. There’s a fair coating of dust on just about every surface, which prompts him to think that perhaps this room hasn’t been used in a long while.

“You’ve done well,” Pierce says. “I think you’re ready for a real mission.”

“He’s only been training for three months,” Rumlow argues. 

Which is unfair, the Soldier thinks. He's been back for a month now, so four months. And that's not counting the four weeks he spent on a frozen fucking wasteland. 

Pierce levels him with a look. “He outscored almost everyone in training, and he out-survived Four and Seven, who were his main competition. This is our winner, Rumlow. He’s our Asset. Our Winter Soldier.”

“You knew he was going to win,” Rumlow says. “That doesn’t mean we should send him out before he’s ready.”

“He  _ is  _ ready,” Pierce says coldly. “Now, leave. I need to brief him on his mission.”

Rumlow doesn’t look convinced, but he doesn’t argue with Pierce any further. He leaves the room without a word. The Soldier remains rooted to his spot, and Pierce sits down across from him.

Pierce holds up a file folder and offers it to him. The Soldier takes it automatically, accidentally brushing their fingers together in the transfer. Pierce snatches his hand back as if it’s been burned. The Soldier looks down at the folder and skims the first page—a profile on a man, Nicholas J. Fury.

“This man has been stirring up a lot of trouble,” he says, wiping his fingers on the front of his suit. “Incapacitate him. Make it look like an accident. You don’t have to kill him, but that just means more work for you later. Understand? You’ve got seventy-two hours.”

The Soldier nods and flips the folder shut. He brings it with him as he leaves the room and goes upstairs to start gearing up for his mission.

+++

They fly him back in a jet plane. He’s still not entirely sure what country the Red Room is in, but he knows that they fly over an ocean to return to wherever brought him from. He looks at the sea below him and wonders, for a long time, what it would be like if the plane were to fall out of the sky and into the water. Would he survive that? 

He shuts the blind over the window and takes a breath. His heart is beating quickly.

Rumlow gives him a small pouch full of ingredients. The Soldier peeks inside; it seems to be a charm bag.

“Keep this on you,” he says, “and when you change into your familiar form while you’re wearing a backpack, it’ll change with you. You won’t just be a dog running around wearing a backpack and a sniper rifle.”

The Soldier takes it and puts it in his pocket. Familiars inherently have the ability for their clothes to change with them when they transform, but carrying objects is a different story. Things like backpacks are usually too big to change with them. This little bag gives him an extra boost, which he appreciates.

Sleep is difficult, this time around. When he was first coming here, he was able to fall asleep despite his discomfort in the small enclosure. But this… this is different. He paces constantly, can barely sit down for more than a minute or two before he’s hopping back onto his feet. Rumlow shouts at him and the Soldier throws him a withering look.

“Sit the fuck down,” Rumlow snaps.

The Soldier stops and shifts on his feet before inching forward and pacing again. 

Rumlow shoots out of his seat and grabs the back of his neck. The Soldier startles and fights back, but Rumlow is stronger than him right now. He forces him onto the ground. First to his knees, then shoving his face to the floor.

“Know your fucking place,” Rumlow says, grabbing him by his hair, pulling his head so that his chin jerked up. His chin scrapes against the ground. “You follow directions when you’re around me. I know you gave the orders to the other Wolf Spiders last month, but you’re still nothing. You got it? Compared to me, you’re  _ nothing _ . You’re just a filthy little demon, hear me? You’re  _ disgusting _ .”

He drops his hold on the Soldier’s hair, letting his face fall to the floor. He moves to stand, but Rumlow puts a foot on his back, pressing into him so that he stays down. He stops struggling.

Rumlow doesn’t let him stand the entire plane ride. He makes him lie there on the ground for hours, and then makes him crawl when the hostess comes out with their food. He eats the meal-replacement bar because he has to, not because he wants to—but Rumlow still sneers at him for it while he eats his steak.

They land just as snow begins to fall. The sky is cloudy and gray, and it’s nearing dark.

Rumlow writes something down on a piece of paper and hands it to him.

“Meet me at this address in seventy-two hours,” he says gruffly. He pulls his winter jacket around him more securely. “If you ain’t there  _ on the dot _ , you’re not gonna like what happens.”

The Soldier nods silently and shoulders his gear a little more securely. He starts walking.


	9. Chance Meeting (Pt. 1)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Happy New Year! Let's celebrate with another chapter! :^)
> 
> Fun fact: I barely proofread this! So there's a bunch of mistakes! I'll fix those later!

###### STEVE

“Mr. Wilson tells me you’re not coping.”

Steve shifts in his seat but refuses to make eye-contact with the man seated before him. Dr. Xavier, that’s how he introduced himself. He’s nice enough, from the twenty minutes Steve has been sitting here, refusing to speak. He hasn’t yelled, hasn’t even raised his voice. He simply speaks in a soft baritone, gently trying to coax Steve out of his silence, like Steve is a frightened animal.

“He said that you were Bonded. Is that correct?”

An angry voice in his head tells him that Sam really ought to stay out of business that isn’t his own, and then Steve tells that voice to shut up because at least Sam gives a shit. He runs a hand through his hair and nods in sharp, jerky movements. _Yes_ , they were Bonded.

There’s still a small part of him, even though he never found Bucky, even though everyone told him that he’s hoping for nothing, even though the Hydra facility burned to the ground and there were no humans left inside… there’s still a small part of him that wishfully thinks that perhaps he escaped. Perhaps he _is_ still alive. Perhaps he’s somewhere, waiting for Steve to find him, and Steve has just given up too soon.

But if that’s true, Steve wants desperately to know why Bucky broke the Bond with him. What provoked him? What did Hydra say to make him do it? Was he forced to, or did he do it of his own free will?

So many questions left unanswered, and now he’s not even sure he’ll ever know.

“You can understand why Sam Wilson was concerned about you, then,” Dr. Xavier says. “You’ve heard the statistics? You know the dangers?”

Yes. He sighs, running a hand through his hair before looking up at Dr. Xavier. “Yes, I knew the dangers. And I did it anyway. I’m fine.”

“Dangers” being the upsettingly high suicide and death rate of True Bonds, after one of the pair dies before the other. Steve knew of these facts; SHIELD consistently reminds their agents of these facts to push down the idea of Bonding, especially with True Bonds.

Jumping on the chance to finally get a response from his patient, Xavier says, with such a matter-of-fact tone, “You did it anyway… because you loved him?”

Loved? Steve wants to laugh, but it’s not funny. Loved? What a stupid question; what an understatement.

“I still do,” Steve admits. His tone turns hard and unforgiving as he says, “And I’m not going to stop loving him anytime soon. I don’t want anyone pushing me to start a relationship, because it’s not happening.”

Xavier says, “No one is asking you to start a relationship with anyone, Steve. No one is pushing you to do that. We are pushing you to handle this in a healthy way, in a way that will ease your suffering and help you, eventually, move on.”

A stupid, sad part of Steve doesn’t want to move on. Moving on when he’s the cause of Bucky’s death seems to be selfish, like he’s trying to ease his conscience and remove himself from blame. He deserves to suffer through it, and all the challenges it may bring up, no matter how much time it will take.

“I can’t move on,” Steve says.

Xavier raises an eyebrow. “Can’t or won’t?” he asks.

 _He doesn’t understand_. “You’re a witch, yeah?” Steve asks him.

Xavier smiles at him. “I believe I should be the one asking the questions, but… yes. I’m a witch.”

Steve looks at him, up and down. Calculating. “You’ve been in love, I’m sure. But you don’t understand; Bucky and I were Bonded. Have you ever been Bonded?”

Xavier bristles at Steve’s words. “No, I have not.”

“Then you don’t get it.” Steve leans back into his chair, huffing out a frustrated breath. “You’ll never understand until you feel it. You’ve read about souls and magic, right? You do know, right? How much power it is?”

Xavier looks down at his lap. “Yes, I have. We all tend to forget, though.”

_We do, indeed._

“It’s more power than you think,” Steve says. “And it’s a lot of emotion. Imagine… imagine having everything you’ve wanted. Imagine being perfect and complete. Having that one thing that’s always been missing, and then it’s ripped away from you, and you’re the way you were before, but it feels worse. You feel empty and alone. Because that’s how it feels.”

Xavier looks at him and says, “Steve, I know I’ll never understand. But that doesn’t mean that you should never get better. It doesn’t mean that you should end your life. You can still find purpose without your True Bond. You just have to look. So I go back to my original question, Steve: can’t move on, or won’t move on?”

Steve falls silent at Xavier’s answer. Can’t or won’t? Those words have truth tied within them. There is a small part of Steve that believes he’ll always be in love with Bucky, that he physically can’t get past that. But there’s another part of him that knows that he’s just being stubborn, that wants to wallow in sadness for the sake of sadness.

“I guess it’s bit of both,” Steve admits.

Dr. Xavier nods. “And what will your purpose be, Steve?” he asks.

Steve has no answer for that.

+++

Natasha is waiting for him in the waiting room of the therapist’s office. She said she went with him for moral support, but Steve suspects that she went to make sure that he didn’t leave in the middle of the session. She stands up when he walks back into the waiting room, giving him a smile that he can’t find the strength to return. She loops her arm with his as he gets close enough, and they walk together, in step, out of the office together.

“How did it go?” she asks, once they’ve exited the building.

Steve is silent for a moment. “It went fine,” he says. “Better than I thought.”

She smiles and then drops her gaze to the ground as they reach Steve’s car. They drive back to SHIELD together, listening to the radio, not needing to make small talk.

They spend their day at the office and Steve feels marginally better for talking to the therapist, but his question still lingers in his mind all day. Steve supposes he could work harder at what he already does, but that kind of feels like a fake answer, something to throw the doctor off his back because he doesn’t want to talk about it, and Steve wants to give a thoughtful response at their next session.

He works until a little later than needed, trying to finish some paperwork for a deadline coming up. He hasn’t done much fieldwork in the past few months, and, to be honest, he’s getting a little sick of it. But part of him is afraid to get back in the game.

Finally, Steve gives up and decides to go home for the night. Natasha and Sam left hours ago, and Steve feels like he’s the only one left besides Natasha, who’s getting more coffee to help her power through the night, but to his surprise, he sees the Director in the elevator.

“Rogers,” he says. “I’ve actually been meaning to talk to you.” He looks at Steve as they begin their descent down to the ground floor.

“Walk with me,” Fury says. Steve does as he’s told, falling into step next to the Director as he makes his way down the hallway towards the exit.

“Your work is greatly appreciated here, Steve, at SHIELD,” he says, and Steve can already hear the words that are coming next, _Sadly, we have to let you go—_

“That’s why I’m going to need you to work a bit quicker to get to the bottom of this investigation.”

Steve stops, surprised at where this conversation is heading. “What?” he asks.

Fury looks at him briefly with heavy, chocolate-brown eyes. “There’s something strange happening, Rogers,” he says, quickly, quietly, like someone will hear. “I can’t put my finger on it, but there’s definitely something wrong, and it may have something to do with Hydra.”

“What makes you so sure?” Steve asks, warily.

“Let’s just call it a gut feeling,” he mutters. They reach the doors and push outside. Steve stands with Fury for a moment while a valet retrieves his car.

“Just do me one favor, Steve,” Fury says, which—wow, the Director never calls him by his first name. “Don’t trust anyone. Got it? Natasha and Wilson are probably okay, but… anyone else approaches you? Get out. Understand? Get out.”

Steve blinks in surprise. “O-okay.”

Fury nods and takes his keys from the valet, who has just returned. “See you tomorrow, Rogers,” he says.

Just as he’s making his way around the car, though, Steve hears the short, sharp sound of a silenced gunshot, and Fury collapses to the ground.

 

Everything moves in slow motion.

Steve rushes to Fury’s side, the valet boy stumbling backwards in shock. Steve tells the valet to call an ambulance, and then repeats his request, louder, when the boy just stares blankly at the ground.

The boy pulls out his phone and dials. Steve commands him to stay with Fury, and he looks around frantically, wondering where the shot came from.

Across the street, Steve sees a man leaving through the front doors with a large backpack. His face is partially obscured by a scarf wrapped around his neck. He’s walking with quick movements. He glances quickly at the scene before making off, quickly and quietly.

Steve starts crossing the street, his eyes on this man. He vaguely hears the valet yelling at him. _Where are you going? Come back! Hey! Mister!_  

He calculates it in his head: _how long would it take for the sniper to dissemble his gun, stuff it in his backpack, and get from the roof to the ground floor?_ Precisely the amount of time between the gunshot and the second this man leaves through the glass doors, just a couple minutes. Thirty seconds to dissembled the gun, two minutes to get down the stairs, if he wanted to avoid an elevator camera, with a clear shot of his face. Steve steps closer. Head down, quick strut. There is a scarf that he just wrapped around his neck, pulled over his chin and mouth. The evidence piles higher and Steve is becoming angry.

 _He’ll run if he has something to run from_ _,_ Natasha’s voice says, in his head. Steve starts jogging towards him.

Steve is getting closer. The man must see him out if the corner of his eye, because he turns around, glances at Steve, and then starts running.

_Gotcha._

Steve takes off after him, arms pumping by his sides, and suddenly time has sped up again and everything is happening so quickly. The man pushes trashcans to fall in Steve’s way, which he hurdles easily. The man cuts through traffic, dodges civilians, and turns a corner before Steve knows what to do. Steve tries to follow him through traffic, trying to catch up to him. His coat was black. A light jacket, more of a windbreaker than a winter coat. His backpack was huge, it must have been where he stored his gun. Steve never caught his face, other than that he’s Caucasian. His eyebrows had been obscured by the largeness of the hood of his coat, and his eyes where an indiscernible color, as Steve only saw him from a distance.

Steve makes it through the street unharmed, and the man is hindered by a passing group of tourists and is forced to slow down. That’s when Steve is able to catch up to him, and he grabs his sweatshirt. The man tries to pull away, and in doing so, reveals what the man has been hiding underneath.

His arm is made of metal.

Steve is caught off guard by the sight of it. Pure metal, shimmering and moving like liquid. Steve barely registers before the man punches him in the face. Steve stumbles backwards and the man doesn’t wait to hit him with another blow, just runs like his life depends on it. He only just barely gets the color of his eyes _—blue? No, gray, definitely gray_ _—_ before he lands on his ass and his head cracks against the concrete.

He only regains his bearings once the man is long gone. He finds himself on the ground, and he knows now that _that_ is what a one-punch knock-out feels like. Holy shit.

There’s a group of concerned people surrounding him, looking down and murmuring things at him. _Are you okay? What happened? Did you know that man? Do you want us to call the police?_

Steve sits up and shakes his head. “I’m fine, I’m fine,” he mutters. He grows annoyed with their pestering and stands up—stumbling when he gets a headrush—and pushes through the group. They scatter and some exclaim their displeasure, but Steve has to make it back to Fury. He has to make it back, even though the heavy feeling of shame weighs on his chest. He didn’t catch the sniper.

He needs to get back to Fury. He can hear the sound of sirens in the distance, realizing that he’s gone four city blocks in his attempt to catch the man with the metal arm.

 

Natasha is at the scene when he finally arrives. The ambulance is not.

“What happened?” she asks, and Steve relays what he saw to her, how he chased the man down the streets. It hurts a little to speak, the muscles in his face protesting any movement after being punched so goddamn hard. Natasha nods and listens carefully, and then sighs when Steve’s story is finished.

“Can’t make that kind of shit up,” she says, frowning.

Steve rubs his jaw, opening and closing it a few times and wincing. “What about Fury?” he asks, fingertips still pressing into his muscles.

She glances at him before flitting her eyes away again. “They took him to Metro-General,” she says.

Steve frowns. “In Hell’s Kitchen?” he asks.

“It’s closer than you think,” she says, smiling a little. “You’re not in Brooklyn anymore, Rogers. Times Square is only a few blocks that way.” She points north. Steve feels strange to think that he hasn’t been to Brooklyn in months now, and that he still doesn’t find Midtown to be a proper home for him.

He frowns, his eyebrows coming together. Before he can dwell on it any longer, he says, “Let’s go to Metro-General, then.”

 

Steve drives while Nat sits next to him, giving directions. The drive is less than a mile, but the traffic is awful and it’s nearly half an hour before they finally get their car parked in the parking garage next to the hospital. They make it to Fury’s room, and Steve catches the attention of the nurse that’s leaving from there to ask a few questions.

“Excuse me,” he says. She turns around and Steve immediately feels bad for bothering her, considering she looks about ready to drop on the floor with exhaustion.

“Yes?” she asks.

Steve bites his bottom lip in worry and then asks, “How is he? What’s his condition?”

She sighs, almost incomprehensibly, and says, “His wounds were pretty severe. We had to put him in a drug-induced coma to save him, but…” She looks up at him, blinking slow and owlish. “He’s in critical condition.”

“And if he survives… do you know when he’ll wake up?”

She presses her lips into a firm line. “There’s no ‘when’ with comas. He could wake up tomorrow, or he could wake up in a month, or…”

“Never,” Steve finishes for her.

She nods and sighs again. She pushes her dark, wavy hair out of her face and stands there for a moment. After a silence, she looks up at Steve in a way that is compassionate while still managing to be blunt. “I have to go. Call me if something happens. He should be stable for now, but…”

Steve nods as she trails off and steps back into the room with Fury and Natasha.

“I was so worried that he was going to fire me because of the thing with Bucky,” Steve says. “He told me to walk with him, and I thought for sure that he was going to fire me. I haven’t… I haven’t been on a field mission in months, and I’ve been slacking off so much, and I thought he was just going to tell me to pack up my stuff and be out in two weeks. But he didn’t. Even though he probably should.”

Natasha is silent and Steve continues on, not bothered by her lack of response.

“When Bucky and I first Bonded… he chewed me out. Big time. I know SHIELD looks down on Bonds, but I didn’t think that he was actually going to reprimand me for it. I was so pissed at him. I told him that he doesn’t understand, called him prejudiced… I’m lucky he didn’t fire me _then_. I didn’t deserve a second chance from him. I…” He trails off.

Steve looks over to her and then back at Fury’s still form, lying on the mattress. The lights are all off except for the one directly about Fury’s bed, and he’s bathed in light, looking ethereal, save for the cut on his face where he probably smacked his head on the concrete.

Silence falls over them again, and Steve mentions that they should go, traffic is probably getting worse. They leave the hospital shortly after and Steve drives them both back to the Tower. Nat follows Steve up to his floor. It’s horribly silent for a moment before Natasha comes out of her thoughtful reverie to speak.

“You do know _why_ SHIELD looks down on Bonds between witches and familiars?” she asks.

“Because they want to repress a vital part of the identities of cunning folk?” he says dismissively. He doesn’t care, doesn’t want to talk about it now.

She shoots him a look, one that he’s unsure how to decipher, but makes no attempt to respond to him or just acknowledge his statement. He tries again.

“Because we’ll probably shoot ourselves with the guns they give us if our Bonds die?” he asks.

“Steve,” she snaps. “That’s not funny.”

“I wasn’t trying to be,” he says, shoving his hands in his pockets. He actually wasn’t. It’s a valid fear, to be the enabler of someone’s suicide.

She lets out a growl of anger. “Don’t you get it, Steve? SHIELD is perfectly aware of how powerful True Bonds are. They know exactly what you’re going through, and they’re terrified of what you’re capable of. And they’re terrified of what could happen to you if you’re left to your own devices, with or without your True Bond.”

Steve just stares at her, wondering what’s gotten her so wound up all of a sudden. She was silent on the way over here, and silent when they got here, and now suddenly she seems frustrated with him.

She takes out her phone and taps quickly into the device before handing it to him. The screen shows a wall of text, a PDF of some old book. He looks at her, and she just nods to it, a silent command of _read it, dumbass._

He drops his head down and reads.

 

 

> _The theory that is popular among spiritual scientists and alchemists is this: the Big Bang that created our universe was so powerful that it lent to the creation of “Souls.” Souls are powerful essences that are believed to be immortal; however, new Souls are created on a fairly regular basis. Souls do not take up any space, but instead are most similar to radiation—specifically gamma rays. Souls possess more energy and power than superluminous supernovae, or “hypernovae,” and are able to transcend several planes of reality with ease._
> 
> _Souls cannot be seen or accessed by humans, but some beings, known to scientists as thaumaturgists—and to the public as “cunning folk,” “witches,” and “familiars”—can channel the power of their Souls into physical form. This phenomenon is what we know to be Magic. It is unclear what allows these beings the ability to control Magic, whether it be a gene mutation or something else._
> 
> _Witches and familiars have the power to fuse Souls together, creating one very large, and very powerful Soul. Through this process, known as “Binding,” the respective with and familiar will notice a change in their Magical ability. Some especially strong Bonds may be able to detect their partner’s emotions and—_

“Okay, that’s enough,” Steve says, shutting the screen off and handing the phone back to her. His head is swimming with too much information.

“SHIELD cites that exact passage in their human resource booklet when they talk about employee conduct,” Natasha says, closing the book. She looks up to him, trying to convey some meaning that Steve simply cannot grasp.

“And what’s your point?”

“My point is that you’re doing exactly what everyone was scared you’d do!” she exclaims. “You’re shutting down. You’re giving up. That’s why Fury chewed you out, Steve. Not because he’s prejudiced, because you know he’s now. When you Bonded with Bucky, he was all you could talk about. When he got hurt, you missed work. When he was taken, you led Clint, Sam, and _me_ into a Hydra base to get him back. Don’t you _get_ it, Steve? Bucky is your weak spot. SHIELD knows it, but even worse… _Hydra_ knows it.”

He runs a hand through his hair. He’s well aware that Hydra knows his weakness towards Bucky. That’s why they took him in the first place, right?

“Steve,” Nat says. He looks up at her again. “Hydra knows your weakness towards Bucky. You can do two things, got it? You can do two things. You can either let Hydra take advantage of you forever… or you can show them what happens when they fuck with Steve Rogers and his True Bond.”

Finally, what she’s saying makes sense. A sick, angry smirk makes its way to Steve’s face, and he realizes now that he has an answer to his problems. Inside, he somehow feels cold and hot at the same time. Perhaps that is just what vengeance feels like.

“The doctor told me that I can still live, even though Bucky’s dead,” Steve says slowly. “He asked me what I was going to do to give my purpose. I told him that I didn’t know just then.” He stands up, feeling taller somehow. He hasn’t felt this power since he first got the Serum from Dr. Erskine.

“But I know now,” he continues. “I’m going to find every Hydra base and burn it to the ground. I’m not gonna stop until all of Hydra is either dead or captured.”

Natasha looks at him and a little smile quirks the corner of her lip upwards. “That sounds like a lot for one man,” she points out. “Maybe you’ll need some help.”

“Maybe I will,” Steve says. He smiles back at her, his first real smile in months.

Perhaps he can give his life purpose, after all.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey there kids. Sorry for the big delay, which was partly due to finals, partly due to Stucky Secret Santa (which has been posted if you want to read it!) and partly due to this really upsetting writer's block. I'm powering through--and I think it's mostly because part of me wants to just take this entire series and rewrite it, but I know I shouldn't. Writing is hard! 
> 
> Anyway, Steve's character has been quite difficult to pin down, but after watching Civil War again, I think I'm good to go. Sometimes I get caught in that idea where I'm like, "How do I write a character that has no flaws?" But I just need to remember that Steve has plenty of flaws, the biggest one being that he's a little shit.
> 
> I've also started an original novel, which is like... not a good idea when I'm trying to finish this. So we'll see how that pans out. Stay tuned, kids!


	10. Trials

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Sorry I'm so late in posting these chapters! I had like a 5-part excuse as to why it's taken so long, but in reality it can just be summed up to I didn't fucking write when I should have and I'm sorry. Senioritis is real! I don't want to do anything except watch Netflix. (i finally started watching Luke Cage and holy fuck. holy fuc)  
> Anyway, pals, there's a little trigger warning in the endnotes if you're worried. There's also a little question down there that I would be happy if you answered! I love you all and thank you for waiting so patiently.
> 
> I didn't proofread at all and I don't care!!! I'm so tired!!!!!!!!

Against Sam’s desires, Steve is at work the next day.

He throws himself into his work, hitting the books harder and researching long into the night. Sam looks at him worriedly while Natasha stands by and makes sure he eats and drinks water throughout the day, which Steve is very grateful for.

The truth is that Steve doesn’t really care what happens to him now. He feels—in some strange way—that a storm is brewing within his city, within himself. He’s not sure what’s going to happen, or if he can handle it, but he knows that he’s going to give absolutely 100%, maximum effort until the day he dies, however close or far that may be.

Desk work absolutely kills him, and it makes him antsy, but it’s not like he can find a lead just charging into the world with no plan. As badly as he wants to find the asshole that did this to Fury, he’s not sure where he went or if he’s even affiliated with Hydra (which is the most probable theory, but he wants to make sure before he goes anywhere making false accusations).

He doesn’t really know what to do, but he knows that Fury told him to not trust anyone. Steve frowns to himself, because it’s nearly seven o’clock and he hasn’t found any leads as to who the sniper might be, but he decides to go ahead with his idea anyway. He can’t trust anyone at SHIELD anymore, so…

He sticks a flashdrive into his computer and takes all of his work on the case— _all_ of it—and downloads it onto his flashdrive. Making sure he has everything, he deletes his work off of his computer and does a thorough check to make sure he got everything. Any internet searches, pictures, interviews with the Hydra agents in custody… all of it has to go.

He’s just pulled the flashdrive out of his laptop when Sam walks into the office. He’s rubbing a hand on his head, eyebrows pulled in and forehead pinched.

“This place gives me a fucking headache, man,” he says to Steve with a grimace.

“You alright?” Steve asks.

“Yeah,” he sighs, and then reconsiders. “Well, no,” he amends. “Maria is pissed because Sitwell is taking over as acting Director and not her.”

Maria Hill being the second-in-command to Fury. Steve had figured she’d be a shoo-in for the job, considering Director Fury is out for who knows how long, but it seems like someone has taken over the job meant for her. Sam has been a good friend of hers since he joined SHIELD; she had trained him when he first started.

Eyebrows knitting together, Steve’s mouth drops open. “What? That doesn’t make sense. She’s been Vice Director for years. Sitwell hasn’t even been on administrative staff.”

“That’s what I said!” Sam says, the words bursting out of him in his frustration. “Maria has worked her ass off for this place just for some field agent to take the job that she is clearly more qualified for? What the fuck is that?”

Sam sits down hard at his desk. Steve can see the tension in his shoulders, the lines that have deepened on his face. He wants to make Sam feel better, but there really isn’t anything in his control to help him.

“How’d it even happen?” Steve asks, walking over to lean against Sam’s desk.

“The council voted Sitwell over her, three to two. I don’t even know—” He groans in anger. “Sitwell shouldn’t have even been a candidate, Steve!”

“I know, I know,” Steve says, standing up and holding his hands out to placate him. He touches Sam’s shoulders in what he hopes is a comforting gesture.

“We can’t change anything now,” Steve says to him. “But maybe we can appeal to the council and tell them our thoughts. You and I have been here a while, right? We’ve got some seniority.”

Sam looks ready to kick someone’s ass, and that scares Steve a little, because despite the fact that Sam has no magical ability, his strength and physical power make up for any lack of mystical power.

“Fine,” Sam says. “But I’m not going to stop complaining.”

Steve smiles. “I never expected you to,” he says with a grin.  

After that, Steve finds it increasingly harder to do his work. He’s afraid he’ll sound paranoid, like he’s crazy, if he brings up how strange—not just unfair—it is that Sitwell, who never expressed any interest in the job, is suddenly acting Director when the day before he was little more than a field agent.

Well, he’s already paranoid, there’s no escaping that. Steve has gotten to the point that he can’t work for two minutes before looking over his shoulder. At some point, he’s going to get fucking whiplash.

It’s been four days and Steve hasn’t found a fucking lead. Unsure of whether it’s because he’s distracted or if there’s really not much more to say about the subject, Steve is about to wrap up for the night when he sees and article that catches his eye. It’s nearing seven o’clock. Nat and Sam have both gone home for the night, but Steve hadn’t felt the need to leave just yet, holding out hope for a miracle, which he thinks he’s finally found…

An article written by a journalist—Ben Urich, a man who has been credited with several groundbreaking exposés in the past. He has written a piece on a subsidiary of Strike—Union Allied—pointing out inconsistencies in their public tax returns… It’s the only time that something like this has been mentioned in public, and steve is unsure of why it hasn’t gotten much attention until he reads it.

The article is small and a little vague, and Steve wonders why Mr. Urich felt inclined to write such a piece that is not nearly as detailed as his past articles. He gets the name of the news source— _The Bulletin_ , centered within Hell’s Kitchen—and decides that he needs to speak to the journalist in person. He can’t decide whether he wants to get more news against Hydra from Urich or if he wants to relay his experiences to him, have him write an article that will send Hydra sprawling… both options sound good, but first he needs to actually talk to the man.

He leaves work that night, Natasha waving at him as he power-walks to his car. She looks like she wants to speak with him, but Steve is too involved with his own problems at the moment to really care, and he needs to get to _The Bulletin_ ’s offices before they close for the night, at nine.

Traffic is surprisingly light, but when Steve makes it to the office, there are only a few people working, still—a janitor who pays Steve no mind, and a receptionist who is playing spider solitaire on her computer. She waves Steve inside after he signs in. She makes him put on a sticker that says “GUEST” and Steve’s name in his sloppy handwriting underneath.

The building is only two floors, so Steve tries the first one after he forgets to ask the receptionist where Ben Urich’s office is, and figures he’ll just explore on his own.

The elevator dings pleasantly and lets him off on the first floor, which is filled with desks on an open floor plan. Steve is surprised that there’s nearly no one there, just a woman that he can see in a private office in the back.

He makes his way to the back, going to talk to the woman to see if she knows where Mr. Urich is and if he can speak to him. He really hopes he’s still here, as he would like to get his questions answered tonight. Sleep will be impossible otherwise.

“Excuse me?” he says, knocking on the door lightly.

The office is crowded with stacks of papers. There are framed clippings of newspaper articles on the wall, which are an off-white color in the flickering light. Her hair looks startlingly more yellow than blonde, like a lemon. The woman turns, and Steve can’t tell if it’s the lighting, but she looks especially pale, with pink splashed in a splotchy pattern on her cheeks, like she’s been crying.

“Uh—” he starts, unsure of whether or not to ask her if she’s alright.

“Can I help you?” she asks, and Steve decides against asking her if anything’s wrong because she seems to not be in the mood for these kinds of questions.

He smiles in what he hopes is a gentle way and says, “Hi, I’m Steve Rogers.”

She eyes him up and down and says, “Karen Paige.”

Taking the article out of his pocket, he raises his eyes up to her and then glances back down. “I’m here to see a Ben Urich?” he says.

“Ben Urich?” the woman asks.

“Yeah,” Steve says. He takes the printout in his hand and unfolds it, stepping towards her so he can show it to her. “I’d really like to speak with him. He wrote this article about—”

“Ben Urich is dead,” she interrupts him, and Steve’s mouth snaps shut.

After a very long, very silent pause that leaves Steve’s ears ringing, he folds the paper up again. Now her blotchy, pale face makes more sense.

“I’m sorry,” he says, his ears burning. “I didn’t—sorry, I didn’t know.” He can’t tell if he’s embarrassed or ashamed, but he tucks the article back into his pocket and starts to turn and leave. “I won’t bother you.”

As Steve is walking back towards the stairwell, he hears a shifting of papers behind him, and then a voice call out.

“Wait,” the woman says, and Steve stops in his tracks, turns to meet her eyes.

“Maybe I can help,” she says. “I was working with him, before…” She trails off, her mouth set in a grim line, before she comes back to herself. “What did you say his article was about?”

“It was about a—a company. Union Allied?”

She looks at Steve, unsure of him, unable to tell if she can trust him or not. Steve just wants to tell her that she can, but he knows she has to make up her own mind.

“Union Allied,” she repeats. “Why are you interested?”

Steve nervously clenches and unclenches his fists. Sighing, he says, “I was hoping that Ben Urich would have more information on the article he wrote. It kind of pertains to an investigation I’m running.”

“Investigation? For who?”

Steve smiles blandly at her, and she seems to understand.

“Can’t tell me?” she asks.

“No,” Steve says, with a pinched look on his face. He wishes he didn’t have to be so secretive, especially since it won’t do anything to help her lack of trust in him.

“Hm,” she hums, but she looks amused rather than angry. “I wasn’t really familiar with his research, not off the top of my head. Um…” She stops for a second, looking around. “This was his office. If there’s anything for you to find, it would be on his computer.” She rifles around the desk she’s standing at for a moment and then pulls out a laptop that was buried by paper. “You can look around? If you want.”

Steve takes the computer out of her hands and holds it securely to his chest. “No, I think that’s fine. Unless you have anything you can tell me?”

She shakes her head, and Steve starts, again, to walk out until she says, “Wait.”

He stops in his tracks and looks back at her. She’s biting her thumb nail—a nervous habit. “There might be something.”

“About Union Allied?” he asks.

“Yes. Well, sort of. Union Allied is a subsidiary of Strike, right?”

Steve nods and she drops her hand from her mouth. “Last night,” she says. “There was something strange that happened in Louisiana.” She frowns a little, her forehead wrinkling. “You know how Southerners feel about magic. They picked up a familiar and were about to give him a… a trial.”

“A witch trial?” Steve asks. She nods, and he feels sick to his stomach.

They’re not as common anymore. They don’t happen as frequently as they did half a century ago, but they still happen. Some fucked-up humans grab a familiar or a witch off the street and put them on “trial” for their “sins.” As if they had a choice in the matter, as if they could help who they are. Most of the time, their agressors use special magic-resistant rope or handcuffs to cut them off from their one hope at escape.

Steve needs to remember how lucky he is to be living in New York, where the chance of that happening to him is slim to none. Some people aren’t so lucky, aren’t as blessed, aren’t as privileged.

“Yeah,” she says, tearing him out of his thoughts. Her eyes flick up to his, knowing. “But something happened.”

Steve’s eyebrows draw together. “What happened?”

She purses her lips together. “It’d be better if I just showed you.”

Reaching into her purse, she grabs her phone and pulls it out. She fiddles around for a second before bringing him over to watch a video.

Shaky camerawork, shot off of some asshole’s phone.

“It was a live feed,” she whispers, and that makes Steve feel even worse. “They wouldn’t have posted it if they knew what was going to happen. But it was a live feed, so.”

Steve looks at her and then back to the phone. It’s night, in the video, but several people are carrying flashlights and they’re pretty near a streetlight. There’s a shot of a wooden pillar, surrounded by a large pile of sticks, like a bonfire. A ring of people standing around it, wearing black hoods, watching as a car drives up. Two men get out of the car and drag someone out from the backseat. The person’s face is covered, but it’s obvious that this is their victim, considering there’s a pillowcase of some sort tied around their neck. They push the person around, pushing them to the ground, and Steve can’t see them well but there’s rope around their wrists so that’s why they keep falling to the ground, unable to keep steady.

The man that drove them there says something that can’t really be picked up on the video, but the ring of people all cheer as the victim is tied to the pole.

“He can’t get out, right?” the person behind the camera says, the first discernible words in the video.

“Nah,” the ringleaders calls back. “I used magic-resistant rope. Paid a fucking fortune. He shouldn’t be able to get out.”

The victim is tied to the pole, head slumping downwards, only half-conscious. Gasoline is thrown on the sticks, a match is struck, and the entire thing goes up in flames. The people cheer. They cheer and Steve feels like he’s going to throw up.

“That’s enough,” Steve says, reaching to take the phone away from his face.

“No—watch,” Karen says. “Look.”

The fire burns for a whole twenty seconds before he sees the man in the middle of the flames start to shift around. He isn’t screaming, hasn’t even said a word. The people don’t even seem to notice until—

_CRACK._

Several heads swivel around to look at the man in the flames, his arms now apart, freed from their confines. He steps out of the flames, head bowed, and pulls the hood off his head. Dark, wild hair tangles around his face, and Steve can’t see him clearly but he can tell he’s fucking pissed.

He changes—he was a familiar, then—into a black dog. He jumps out of the flames and the people go running, screaming, calling for help as if they’re the vicitims. The familiar jumps forward and grabs the leg of the man that had tied him up in the first place, latching on and refusing to let go. The man screams, tries to beat the familiar off of him, but he’s not giving. Steve doesn’t know what to fucking feel. The cameraperson shrieks and drops the phone, the feed going dark as the night sky above takes up the entirety of the frame.

The sounds of growling and the man’s yelling last for about twenty more seconds before Steve hears a car drive up. The growling ceases, and then only the sound of the man’s groaning can be heard, until a gruff voice rises above the sound of the crackling fire.

“You really gave us the slip, Soldier,” the man says, his voice a deep rumble. “Mr. Pierce isn’t going to be happy about this.”

Footsteps, and then, “What—?” A hand reaches over, covers the screen, and then the camera is lifted off the ground. Steve can see the familiar, now in metal collar with a muzzle, the man on the ground, and—as the camera swoops upwards—a van, with two other men loitering outside of it. With the word “ _STRIKE_ ” emblazoned on the side, along with the company’s logo. Steve’s stomach drops.

“Take him to the van,” the gruff-voiced one says. He nods towards the familiar. The two other people nod, and grab the dog from the leader of the group, lifting him by his legs and bringing him around the back. “How the fuck do I—”

The feed cuts out, screen going black.

Karen looks up at him, but Steve is frozen.

“Does that help at all?” she asks. When Steve doesn’t answer she says, “It was posted on an anonymous chat platform last night. It was taken down an hour later, but some people had some copies floating around this morning and I downloaded it onto my phone before it was completely taken off. I haven’t seen anyone else post it since then, but it’s only been like, twelve hours.”

Steve finally looks her in the eye. She found this video and Steve didn’t, even though Steve was at his computer all day… 

“I think,” he says, “that I’m going to need your help in the future.”

Karen gives him a small smile. “Count me in.”

 

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Squick/trigger warnings:  
> There's a little part where Karen and Steve are talking about a familiar that was captured and put on a "witch trial" (basically they try to burn someone at the stake, but they don't actually do it. Hi I'm a gay POC and I like thinly-veiled metaphors). 
> 
> Also, I was wondering if you guys could help me figure out some logistics to the story? Comment if you're interested in helping a pal out.


	11. Six Little Soldiers

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi everyone!! Sorry it's taken me so long to update, but the chapter I had planned wasn't flowing and then I had an idea... so then I scrapped the chapter I was writing and then wrote THIS down and it's a little bit of a change in direction from where I was originally going but I like this so much better and I hope you do too.  
> I changed the rating bc there really wasn't any reason for me to have it at Mature when the only thing happening was violence and not sex, so. It's Teen now.  
> Also I'm writing a little piece for the Captain America Reverse Big Bang which I'm so excited about! Stay tuned for that work, because it's gonna be great B) (which is why i've been absent as of late)  
> Anyway, enjoy this chapter. I didn't proofread but I'll fix that later. I'm just really excited for yall to read this. It's a little shorter than usual but I think that you'll like it. ;^)

Karen proves to be a vital asset when it comes to research. And while Steve is a captain and a special agent, Karen somehow manages wonderfully in-depth research that Steve never seemed to be able to achieve before.

She finds that the video was shot just outside of New Orleans. The police are baffled by the case but are trying to pursue local leads. They have not found nor arrested anyone yet, and the familiar in the video was never seen before around those parts and has not been seen since.

Upon viewing the video, Steve wasn’t sure what to do besides add it to his small pile of evidence. There’s no identifying the men in the video, and Steve isn’t sure who the familiar was either, the way his hair tangled around his face, covered in grime and dirt… But Steve hopes for his well-being, and wonders what Hydra wanted with him.

Steve rubs his temples. He feels like he’s going crazy, like he’s seeing black dogs wherever he goes. Adding insult to injury. As if everything doesn’t _already_ remind him of Bucky.

He talks to Karen throughout the following week, because she’s easy to speak to and Steve kind of feels like he needs someone to talk to. Not that his friends aren’t more than willing, but… sometimes it’s much easier to talk to strangers. Sometimes it’s much easier to speak to someone who doesn’t know every single thing about you, someone who won’t try to give advice to fix the situation. Someone who just says, “Yeah, I understand that feeling.”

Steve hasn’t been to therapy in weeks.

He hasn’t left work and gone home before ten o’clock in weeks.

He watches the video again and again, looking for things he might have missed.

The shaking camera doesn’t bother him as much. The light from the fire flares and distorts the shot. The voices cheer for the death of a living soul. And then he sees something the he didn’t notice before: the familiar’s glinting, silvery arm… He rewinds to see it again, wondering if it’s just a trick of the eye or if the camera is being strange or if he just needs some fucking sleep.

“Steve,” a voice calls into his office.

Steve starts, ripped away from his thoughts. He looks up and sees Clint peeking through the door. “Yeah?” he asks.

“You should see this,” Sam says, and then disappears out of the doorway. Steve gets up quickly so he can follow.

“Remember our guests of honor?” Sam asks him when he catches up to him at the elevator. Steve looks at him before realizing that he’s talking about the Hydra agents that they still have in custody. Sam pubches in the number for one of the sub-levels of the building.

“Yeah,” Steve says apprehensively. They step off the elevator when they reach their destination and start for the holding cells that they’ve been keeping the agents in, keeping pace as they venture down a long, dank hallway in one of the sub-levels of the SHIELD headquarters. “What about them?”

They reach a large metal door, and Sam frowns as he starts to punch in the lock code. “You’re just going to have to see for yourself, man,” he says. His voice echoes emptily down the hallway.

That’s not very promising, but Steve decides that he might as well shut up and do what Sam says. He punches in the last digit of the code and the heavy metal door starts to swing open. They step inside, and Steve sees what Sam is telling him about.

The Hydra agents that they’ve been keeping in custody (read: jail) are all standing up. They’re facing the doors of their cells, all standing with their hands stiffly at their sides and their chins raised. Their faces are all blank, all six of them, as they stare outwards.

When Steve and Sam walk in, it’s like they haven’t heard anything. They remain in place, their faces impassive, their bodies stiff and unmovable.

The men and women all stare straight ahead as Steve and Sam move to the closest cell — the cell that holds the man that had talked to them so long ago, when this mess first started. The only agent to have ever said anything to them, even if he answered no questions and did little more than try to intimidate them. His eyes don’t move down, but his posture changes ever so slightly. Steve knows he can see them.

“Any reason you guys decided to start doing something interesting now, of all times?” Sam says. His voice is nonchalant and sarcastic. Steve almost cracks a smile at it, but remains impassive.

Steve looks at the man in the cell, scanning him up and down. He doesn’t look different. Same hair — albeit a little longer — same eyes, same clothes. SHIELD has made sure that they eat every day, has made sure that they have time to exercise and socialize so that their mental and physical capacities stay the same as when they were first taken into custody.

The man doesn’t answer Sam’s question. Steve looks in closer, steps closer to the bars.

“What are you doing?” Steve asks him, quiet. His voice still seems loud in the still room.

The man twitches a little. Steve steps in even closer, almost pressing against the bars themselves.

“Steve,” Sam says, and it sounds almost like a warning, but Steve flicks his hand out behind him, trying to say, _wait._

A long, long moment passes as Steve looks at the man in the cell. The man seems to relax in his position just a little.

“Why now?” Steve asks, even softer than before.

A sudden change — the man relaxes completely, his head tilting down to fix Steve with a pointed stare. Steve backs up a little, almost imperceptible. The eyes of the agent are harder, clearer than they seemed before. He looks at Steve like he sees everything about him, every detail, every fact of his life. But Steve is not going to fall for it.

“You didn’t take my advice, Captain Rogers,” he says. His voice is rough from disuse. “I told you to stop meddling with things you don’t understand.”

He almost smiles upon hearing the man’s voice. _Small victories,_ he tells himself. “I’ve never been good at following orders,” Steve says, his heart thumping in his chest.

“No,” the man agrees. “Just giving them.”

Steve doesn’t answer. He waits, Sam standing defensively behind him, waiting for something — they don’t know what. heart thumping in his chest, Steve is unsure if he is excited or afraid.

“Something is coming,” the man continues. “I don’t think you’re ready for it. You’re not strong enough.”

“Why now?” Steve asks again. The man smirks like he’s won something.

“The world is finally ready,” he says. “We’ve waited for so long, but now is the moment.”

“Why?” Steve asks again. But the man just looks disappointed in him.

He shakes his head. “You haven’t been paying close enough attention. You don’t understand.”

“ _What_ don’t I understand?” he says, ready to snap. But he can’t get angry now; he might lose the man’s cooperation.

The agent just shakes his head and smiles like Steve has said something funny. “You don’t know what you’re messing with,” the man says, a cold, mean smile on his face. “The fist of Hydra reaches so much further than you know. You talk of Strike and underground ideologies. But we are so much more. _So_ much more.”

Then he tilts his head up, takes a step back, and resumes his previous position. The conversation is over.

“Hey,” Sam says. “Wait a minute.”

But the moment’s passed. He is done talking, and it seems that he won’t be speaking again any time soon. Steve looks back at Sam for some indication of what to do.

Sam puts a hand on Steve’s shoulder and guides him back, near to the door. Steve takes one last look at all the agents and gets a sinking feeling in his stomach.

“Notice anything about the way they’re acting?” Steve whispers to Sam, once they are an acceptable distance from the door.

Sam glances at them quickly, takes note of the way they’re holding themselves, and turns back to Steve.

“Almost like… they’re standing at attention,” he says.

“Yeah,” Steve says, pressing his lips together. He’s trying to keep his cool, but the reality is that he’d never given these agents a second thought after they interrogated them for the last time… that’s a long time to plan, to plot. He should have kept a closer eye… and now something is happening.

But the strangest thing is that they never talked to each other. They were allowed to socialize but didn’t give much more indication to their fellow agents’ existence other than exercising with them in the same room or sitting near them during their time outside of their cells. They didn’t speak. They didn’t communicate in Morse code. Barely touched each other besides passing brushes on the shoulder or accidental run-ins.

Sam has been watching them most days, from camera. Natasha, Clint, other agents… they’ve been watching their activity. This is the only change to happen since they got here.

Steve just doesn’t understand.

“Get Natasha,” Sam says. “I’ll stay here.”

Steve leaves the room with the holding cells and starts back down the hallway, the heavy metal door closing behind him.

He walks quickly down the hallway, a cold rock dropping in his stomach. He can feel something off-kilter about the world, like the very air is filled with electricity. Jogging to the elevator, he tries to dispel the emotion; the agents were just trying to mess with his head. He’s overreacting. There’s no way the agents could hurt them. Considering the high security of the sub-levels, even if they managed to get out of their cells, they never would be able to get past the metal door that locks them into the holding area. Every lock in the holding area is controlled by electromagnet. No need for guards—the only contact they have with SHIELD agents are the men that give them their meals every day, and the agents that lead them from the exercise rooms and back to their cells.

He presses the button to the elevator, going up. The doors open nearly instantly and he steps inside, punching the number for the floor Natasha is probably on. He bounces on his toes — waiting to get to the right floor is agony. The sub-levels of SHIELD have always had a bad effect on Steve. The only way in or out is by elevator, and it makes Steve feel like a trapped rat.

Finally reaching his floor, Steve almost barrels out of the elevator. Walking quickly, he moves to find Natasha. He sees her in the break room for that floor—pouring herself a cup of coffee. Steve calls to her, asks that she comes with him. Sensing his urgency, she leaves the mug on the counter and jogs to catch up with him.

They get on the elevator to head back down to the sub-levels, explaining to her the strangeness of the situation. She listens intently, not interrupting the entire time. It is only when Steve is finished that she finally talks.

“What do you need me to do?” she asks as the elevator door opens. They start to make their way down the hallway.

“I need you to talk to them,” he explains. “I think they might respond a little better to your interrogation. Also, I think—”

But Steve is cut off by the loud, echoing crackle of the lights flickering out.

“Fuck,” Natasha says, as they’re immersed in complete darkness. They stand there, immobilized for a moment before the red emergency lights turn on, and Steve’s heart is definitely beating faster, his breath starting to come quicker. Something is happening. Something… something is happening.

“Something dark,” Natasha agrees, and Steve realizes that he’s said those things out loud. “I can feel it too.”

The two continue on quietly, slowly, Steve looking around at every corner. The red light makes it difficult to see, but it’s better than nothing, and he is on high-alert as his body starts to flood with adrenaline.

And then Steve remembers, and his heart sinks.

“The cells,” Steve says, stopping completely.

“What about the cells?” Natasha says, pausing with him.

“They’re electronically controlled.” Steve feels his heart beating quicker and quicker in his chest. “They’re locked with electromagnets.”

Natasha’s eyes widen as the realization hits her as well. “So if the power’s off…”

“Then the doors are open,” he finishes for her.

Steve and Nat look at each other for a split second before they run down the hallway to the holding area, sprinting as fast as they fucking can.

The door to the holding cells is open. Natasha, always armed, pulls a handgun from her holster at her waist. Slowly, Steve pushes the door open, staying close to the wall in case somehow the agents are armed. When nothing happens, Steve peeks inside.

Steve rushes in, dropping to his knees immediately when he sees Sam sprawled on the floor. He only has a blow to the head; his nose is bleeding but seems otherwise unharmed. He probably tried to hold them off but couldn’t take six of them at once. Natasha stays alert, holding her handgun in front of her and scoping out the room. The cells are all opened, but Steve can’t see any of the agents that were there. They seem to all be gone.

Steve is cradling Sam’s head in his hands, trying to elevate his neck in case he has a concussion or a spinal injury. Sam is hurt, but he’s only passed out. He’ll probably wake up in a few minutes, maybe less.

“I don’t understand,” Nat says, while she checks every cell. Not one Hydra agent is there.

Steve has to agree with her. He doesn’t understand anything that’s going on right now.

“Steve,” she says suddenly. He looks up from where he’s kneeling on the ground.

“What?” he asks.

She presses her lips together worriedly. “If the elevators aren’t working, there’s no way out of here.”

Steve looks at her. “Wait, but—if the elevators aren’t working… and there’s only one hallway in or out….”

She nods. “They’re still down here with us.”

Steve looks around. Nat didn’t find them in their cells, Steve didn’t see them in the hallway when they ran here…

“But… where are they?”

Natasha definitely looks troubled now. “That’s the thing. I don’t know.”


	12. Runaway / New Orleans

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hi kids! We're going back to Bucky's POV, and we're also taking a few steps back in the story. Don't hate me for leaving the last chapter on a cliffie, pls. This chapter picks up right after Bucky has run away from Steve after he shot Fury down, just to clarify. It'll also touch on the events that happened in chapter ten, so if that squicks anyone out or makes them uncomfy, that's your warning. If you want to skip that, go from the line, "'It's late, familiar,'" to the very end. 
> 
> More in-depth spoilers at the end if you're interested.
> 
> Enjoy! I sorta proofread but I probably missed a lot!

###### THE SOLDIER

With the mission finished and the blond man no longer on his trail, the Soldier starts to think. He trots down the street in his familiar form, weaving through the legs of passers-by, barking when people block his view. Humans look at him, unsure if he’s a familiar or a real dog, unsure of whether or not to pat his head. The idea amuses him greatly.

He slinks into an alley, a few blocks away from where he apprehended the blond man, and mulls over his options.

He could go back to Rumlow early, tell him the job is taken care of, tell him that he’s finished and that the target is incapacitated.

Or… he could leave.

It’s not the best idea. But the Soldier finished the job is a little less than forty-eight hours, and the rendezvous isn’t until tomorrow… He has a twenty-four hour head start before he’s late, and Rumlow will probably give him time to show up, which tacks on another hour at least… On the other hand, Rumlow will be pissed if he catches him. The Soldier smiles. _If_ he catches him.

He makes his decision. It wasn’t ever really a competition. He’s going to steal a car.

It’s pretty easy, actually. He doesn’t want to break into a car and he doesn’t want to damage it, because, for all intents and purposes, he’s _borrowing_.

So he waits outside of a gas station and climbs into a car that a man has left the keys in. Easy, really. Almost too easy. While the man is paying in cash at the register of the convenience store, the Soldier turns on the car, sees that he has about a quarter of a tank and mentally tracks out his route in his head. There’s another gas station near here, but he’ll have to move quickly, the police will probably show up…

He drives away while the man is still paying at the counter.

Does he feel bad?

Eh.

Not really.

He doesn’t really have time to feel guilty. Rumlow is going to be looking for him soon, wondering why he didn’t show up for the rendezvous. If his morals are in a battle between “wow I just stole a valuable piece of someone’s property” and “holy shit I’m finally outrunning the people who dumped me in a frozen wasteland for a month,” the latter is definitely more likely to win, and he’s not gonna give a fuck about it.

He doesn’t know where he’s going. South is the cardinal direction that he’s chosen. He can’t really do airports — too many security measures, too many cameras, too many people. So he’s going by car, where he can blend in with the wave of traffic out of town.

Soon, he’ll have to change cars. He could hitchhike, which would mean not having to steal a car, but also a witness to his escape. Not willing to trust anyone, he decides that he’ll have to steal another car. Maybe a from a parking lot that doesn’t have a lot of surveillance, if one exists.

+++

Two days and one more stolen car later, he finds himself in a city that’s different from any other that he’s seen so far.

The last car he stole had a wallet in the cupholder with a hundred dollars inside. He pickpockets an asshole businessman in the gas station and manages fifty more dollars, which is quite exciting to him.

He finds that the farther he gets from New York, the more likely it is that someone is going to have more than a hundred dollars in their wallet. Just a harmless observation.

He sleeps in the car, parked on the side of a the road where no one will find him. He takes the license plates off of his car and replaces them with the plates of a car that he found abandoned on the side of the highway in Virginia.

All in all, he thinks that it’s about a twenty-hour drive to the city he’s in now, not counting the night he’s spent asleep.

He arrives at sunset, and the air is significantly warmer than New York. The wind still has a chill to it, though, and he decides that now would be a good time to buy new clothes. He parks his car outside of a thrift store and goes inside.

He finds himself a few things — a red henley that he likes, a pair of jeans, an oversized green jacket, a non-descript hat that he pulls low over his eyes. He keeps his gloves, worrying about his silver arm. He changes in the bathroom of a gas station and tells himself that it’s perfectly fine to wear gloves even if the weather is getting warm.

The city that he’s in—New Orleans, Louisiana, the sign tells him—has magic that he’s never seen before. The whole city isn’t just accepting magic, tolerating it—they’re _immersed_ in it.  Sigils mark nearly every door, are emblazoned on storefronts and homes alike, symbols for keeping out bad spirits or attracting good luck. Shops advertise fortune readings and gris-gris talismans, the smell of sage wafts serenely out of open doors.

Completely overwhelmed, the Soldier gazes around the streets, looking at the colorful French-style houses that line the street, the Creole cottages that squat near sidewalks  and mansions that tower by their lonesome, surrounded by vast green yards and large, leafy bushes.

And the _music_ —music is absolutely everywhere: in the graveyards, as he walks down the street, whenever he enters a store or passes a restaurant. Street performers stand at their corners, bands play in bars with the doors wide open. Saxophones and deep bass guitars; sad, rumbling voices singing beautiful songs and loud, wailing cymbals crashing along to the beat.

He passes by a restaurant and sees a pot stirring itself through a window. Intrigued by the smell wafting through the open door, he makes his way inside.

A hostess stands at the door and asks him if he’s eating alone, which he nods yes, he is alone. She guides him to a table and tells him that his server will be with him shortly, and hands him a menu.

The menu is full of things that he doesn’t really know what they are, much less how to pronounce them. It seems like some of it is French, but the rest he can’t even decipher. A waitress bounds over to his table a few minutes later, filling up his empty glass using a metal pitcher of water as she greets him warmly. The pitcher is so cold in the warm, humid air that condensation dots the sides of it.

He grabs for the glass nearly the second it’s full, the waitress looking surprised as he does it, her greeting stuttering for a second before she recovers herself.

“Thirsty?” she asks, a little smile quirking up her lips.

The Soldier nods and ducks his head down.

“Anything else I can get you, besides water?”

The Soldier shakes his head.

“Alright,” she says. “Are you ready to order, or do you need a few more minutes?”

The Soldier opens his mouth to answer, but can’t really seem to find the words to answer her. Instead he asks, “What is this place?”

The woman looks a little surprised, and smiles at him. “Never heard of Cajun food?”

The Soldier shakes his head, feeling a little embarrassed for some reason—he feels like, perhaps, he should have read a little bit more about the culture before coming here and asking questions. “I’m sorry, I just—I smelled something from outside and I—”

“Oh, you’re fine,” she says, a big grin on her face. “Just, most tourists come here with their minds made up already.” She leans down over him, her finger going to tap her chin. She looks at the menu in his hand and points to an item— _lobster bisque_.

“That’s my favorite,” she says. “It’s a little heavy, though, if that’s not something you’re looking for right now. Really creamy.”

He doesn’t even really know what lobster would taste like. Is he supposed to know that? The only things he can remember eating besides the meal-replacement bars are the sweet roll from the airplane, and the oranges at the Red Room.

“That’s fine,” he says, clearing his throat. “I’ll take an order of that.”

She smiles brightly at him and writes down his order. “Should be ready soon, okay?” She takes his menu from the table, and he leans back to let her.

He feels strange, being waited on. He feels like perhaps he’s being a bother, but the waitress seems fine with the job, bustling around without a care.

He feels fidgety. He should have asked for a booth in the corner, where he would be able to see what was going on. Instead, he gets to look over his shoulder every five and a half seconds, looking like a thief.

Several minutes pass and he gets up, heads to the bathroom so he can calm himself. He’s pleased to see that it’s just a single room, no stalls; just a sink, a mirror, a toilet, and a trashcan. In there, he splashes water on his face, rubbing his knuckles over his eyes.

For a long second, he stares at himself in the mirror, wondering to himself why the fuck he’s so upset when he’s a familiar in a city of magical people. If anything, humans like Rumlow should be afraid.

He stays in there for a few more seconds before he heads out and sits back down at his table, taking calming breaths and a few sips of water.

The waitress returns to his table soon after he’s sat down, holding his food on a tray. She sets down a bowl of creamy, yellow-orange soup and a bowl of white rice.

She smiles at him. “Can I get you anything else?” she asks him.

The Soldier shakes his head, already captivated by the smell. “I’m alright,” he says, and grabs his spoon. She walks away, telling him to call if he needs anything. He barely hears her, already going for the soup, dipping his spoon into the liquid and bringing it up to his mouth, blowing on it gently before taking a tentative sip.

It’s the best fucking thing he’s ever tasted.

The Soldier sits on the sidewalk outside of the restaurant, unsure of what to do next. He doesn’t have enough to rent a night at a hotel, and he abandoned his car a few miles away—it’s nearing nighttime and he has nowhere to go, which discourages him.

Behind him, the door to the restaurant opens, and the Soldier turns to look. It’s the woman that served him, now no longer dressed in her uniform. She smiles at him in a friendly manner and says, “Hey, long time no see.”

The Soldier smiles as an almost automatic reaction. She’s so friendly that it’s hard not to. She asks, “Don’t you have anywhere to be?” and when the Soldier shakes his head, she says, “Then you don’t mind walking me home.”

The Soldier blinks and replies, “You don’t know who I am,” because she doesn’t.

But she just smiles a small little smile. “It’s better than walking alone at night,” which he has to agree with. There’s a small part of him that wonders if she’s flirting with him, but then decides that she’s probably just being friendly and probably just genuinely doesn’t want to walk home alone.

He stands and walks with her, hands buried deep into his pockets so that she doesn’t feel unsafe around him, and they start walking away from downtown, towards the apartments that line the city limits. It’s a good, long walk, and it allows him to clear his head while she talks sparingly with him. She seems tired, almost dead on her feet, but she becomes a little more alert when she tells him that they’re nearing their destination. The apartments have become increasingly more run-down; some are almost in complete ruins while others seem to be simply empty. It feels like a ghost town.

“Rough neighborhood,” she says, catching the look on his face. He nods. “Some real assholes around here.”

They reach her apartment building and the Soldier waits outside of the lobby doors while she gets her keys out of her pocket. She smiles at him as she grasps her purse in her hand.

“Want to come in?” she asks, and the Soldier smiles a little and shakes his head.

“I’m okay,” he whispers, and she raises an eyebrow at him, like she doesn’t believe him.

“I’m not—I’m not trying to, _you know_.” He thinks he sees her blush in the low light of the streetlamp. “It just gets rough around here at night.”

The Soldier shakes his head again. “I’ll be fine, really,” he says. Mostly he just can’t stay, not if Hydra is on his trail. It’s too dangerous for her. She’s been so nice to him, he would hate himself if he caused any trouble for her.

He finally convinces her that he must go, and then he leaves after he sees her safely inside the building. Quickly, he starts to make his way down the street before he transforms into his familiar form and trots quickly down the street, because this way he can be faster, and most people will leave a dog alone. When he’s out of the neighborhood, he transforms again into his human form, more comfortable to walk down the streets like this.

It’s when he’s half a mile away from her building that he realizes he’s being followed.

Lights from two cars behind him make him cast a long shadow. He turns, blinded momentarily as he tries to make out the cars and who are inside it. He can’t see, so he begins walking faster, but one car just speeds up with him until they pull in front of him. The car shuts off, and the Soldier sees that there are five people inside. The two sitting in front get out first, start walking towards him, and then the three in back get out behind him.

The other car behind him has also stopped. There were two people in that one—they both get out, and the Soldier realizes that he’s surrounded.

“Hey,” a man snarls at him. “It’s late, familiar.”

The Soldier _runs_. Too late does he realize that he is surrounded on all sides—there are already so many around him. And though he is a fighter, a master in his class of assassins and spies, there is an _overwhelming_ number of them, and they are all large and muscled and his gun is empty.

What’s more is that they have obviously done this before.

Two of them grab his arms and the others go for his legs. He tries to twist away, and when that doesn’t work, to change into his familiar form — it trips them up for just a second before they have him again, and he changes back, hoping that the sudden change in weight will make them drop him, but they’re expecting it, and then they drop him on the ground with a hard thud and someone straddles his chest while two others sit on his arms and they punch him in the face, over and over. He kicks hard with his legs but it’s no use. He can taste blood in his mouth and he feels his nose crack painfully and he knows that it’s broken by the stream of blood that gushes from his nose, and then there’s another punch to his face and his vision has stars dotted across it, and then they grab his head by the hair and slam it into the concrete and everything goes black.

There’s the distant feeling of someone putting rope on his wrists. He doesn’t think to move until too late and then he’s tied. The rope makes him feel strange. He feels oddly disconnected from the world, like he’s been hit over the head with something heavy and the world moves in and out of focus.

Except, the world can’t move in and out of focus. There’s a fucking sack on his head and he can’t see. There’s a twenty-minute period where he slides around in the backseat of a car, hogtied, and then there’s the sound of a door opening and someone is grabbing him and pulling him into the night.

Someone is standing him upright. There are voices around him, chanting and screaming and laughing. His stomach churns.

He hears someone say, “Magic-resistant rope,” and his heart plummets. Nervously, he twists his wrists in his confines, and a strange feeling surges through him, like electricity, but then it’s gone.

What’s happening? What’s happening—he can’t tell what’s going on and it makes him panic, before he shoves the feeling down and tries to figure out an escape plan. He trained for months for this, and he’s not about to die the first time he’s on his own.

The hands move him around, and he feels a post against his back and he’s being tied to it, and then he thinks — _witch trial_ , and then he hears a match strike against the box.

His best bet is to either slip free from the rope or to break it with his strength. He doesn’t like either option.

With his vision obscured, he has to rely on his olfactory and auditory abilities. He can smell as well as hear a fire start burning, and his heart rate increases as he realizes that he’s supposed to be dying, but isn’t. He heard the match struck, he heard the fire roar to a start, but for some reason he doesn’t feel it.

His breathing comes heavier, and he feels a little nervous but there’s a part of him that knows, deep down, that this can’t be right. This isn’t right. This isn’t how he thought he’d die, so it can’t be right.

The flames lick at his pant legs but he can barely feel it. He turns his wrists in the rope — it burns a little, but there’s that feeling again: that colorful feeling like two live wires touching, emitting a spark. He rubs his wrists against the rope, trying to see if they’ll give, and the strange, electric feeling floods his body for a second before it dissipates just as quickly as it came. He rubs his wrists once more and forces his hands apart again, and again, and again — and then the ropes snap with a loud _crack_ , and his gloves slip from his hands.

And then the feeling is there full-force: his magic ability floods back into him like a waterfall pouring into a shotglass. He can’t help himself, it feels so fucking wonderful; he tears the hood from his head and transforms into his familiar form, then and there, drunk on his ability, his power, and he leaps forward before he knows what he’s doing. He latches onto the leg of the man that had attacked him originally. Latches on and doesn’t let go, and the guy is screaming in pain and fear, mostly fear.

The humans scatter around him, screaming like they’re the ones that almost died, not him, and he feels a sick sense of pride that he’s the one that caused their fear. They deserve it.

Part of him feels like, if they get to exact their justice on him, then he should exact his justice on them. Of course, that’s not how the world works.

Not at all.

He’s so busy digging his teeth into the guy’s leg that he doesn’t notice the van drive up until he’s being pulled away and there’s a familiar voice growling in his ear—

“You really gave us the slip, Soldier.” Gruff and smug. Must be his handler. “Mr. Pierce isn’t going to be happy about this.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Wow what a ride! So since I'm an asshole who doesn't listen to reason, I'm going to be writing four stories in this series instead of three, like I had originally intended. I have a lot to say on this subject, apparently. So you guys are stuck with me forever. I have a vague idea of what I'm going to do, so I won't ghost out on you guys. This is the first "series" I've done and I'm pretty happy that I've stuck with it thus far, and I'm glad that there are people who actually want to read it, even if it's only a few of you.
> 
> A few spoilers: Bucky goes to New Orleans in this chapter and encounter the magical culture down there. Anyway Bucky has to deal with the witch trial and people attack and try to kill him. 
> 
> I mention Voodoo and hoodoo in passing, but I didn't really want to get too far into it in case that I didn't portray it accurately. I did as much research as I could, but I didn't find as much information as I was hoping, so I decided to leave it vague in case I said the wrong thing. I also talk a little bit about the Cajun culture down there, mostly the FOOD because I've had Cajun food a total of one time and it was the best thing I've ever tasted.
> 
> pls help if I've said anything insensitive in any way.
> 
>  
> 
> EDIT 6/27/2017:  
> Thank you all so much for waiting so patiently! I've been a little busy lately, writing for the Cap RBB. The work that I thought was going to end up a little over 5,000 words actually started nearing 30,000. So while I haven't written in this series for a while, I still plan on continuing this story. I have part 3 planned and have started writing it, and part 4 is in the works. Thank you all so much for your love, your kudos, your encouragement, and your comments! We'll get back to our regularly scheduled programming soon!


	13. Learned Helplessness

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey pals! Sorry for the long delay. Between graduating from high school and work and things for college, I was kinda pressed for time, and then on top of that, I was supposed to be writing for the Cap RBB (that I went over the deadline for). Woo hoo!
> 
> So while there are those very valid excuses, I also want to say that it's so DRAINING to write from Bucky's POV right now. Hydra is the worst, kids!! the WORST!!!!!!!!! trigger/squick warning for basically this entire chapter. it fucking sucks
> 
> this wasn't even beta read in the slightest. if there are any glaring mistakes, feel free to yell at me
> 
> EDIT 10/14/17  
> This chapter has the worst violence in the fic. It won't get as bad as this again, but I'm just letting you know. It's not pretty. If you want to skip the chapter, feel free. Love you all <3

As predicted, Rumlow is pissed at him.

They put a shock collar and a muzzle on him because they think it’s funny— _ha, get it? Because he’s a fucking bitch_ —and toss him in the back of the van, his ankles and wrists tied.

He struggles, at first. His metal arm could probably break the restraints. But the shocks start to get to him, making his muscles sore. He rests on the floor of the van, sliding around with nothing to strap him in place. He bumps his head several times, but he’s too boneless and tired to care. The events of the day start to catch up to him, and he’s filled with some kind of heaviness that his brain simply can’t process.

They toss a meal replacement bar and a bottle of water into the back of the van and tell him to eat, though it’s impossible with the muzzle on his face. He has a feeling that if he tried to take it off, they would punish him for that, too—so he lies there, still and quiet.

He could break out of his restraints, maybe—he did it with the ropes back at the trial. He he keeps still, not wanting to do anything wrong in case they decide that he’s more trouble than he’s worth. Which—he’s probably toeing that line right about now.

He drifts in and out of consciousness for a while. He’s not sure how much time has passed, if it’s hours or days or weeks. It could very well be years.

But the next thing he remembers is waking up in a cold, damp, musty-smelling cell with chains wrapped around his entire body. They criss-cross his chest, wind up and down his arms like metal snakes. While his left arm can’t really feel it, the pressure is there. He’s locked in.

It’s strange. Why would they bother to put him in chains when he’s locked in a fucking cell?

He shifts a little and nearly shouts with the pain that it brings. At first, he’s confused — he doesn’t know where the pain came from, but glancing down, he sees how the chains glow where they’re wrapped around his body. He shifts again, experimentally — and, yep. The chains light up angrily, and he bites down on his tongue so hard that he nearly splits it. The chains are enchanted. Every time he moves, a line burns across his body, the chains red-hot to the touch.

Panic starts to rise in his chest, a sense of claustrophobia that he’s never felt before. He wants to change into his familiar form, but would that make it better or worse? Would he be able to slip out? Or would the chains prevent it from happening in the first place? If he was able to slip out, would Rumlow punish him for bypassing his torture?

Fuck.

He tries to keep absolutely still, his muscles straining with the effort. Do they hurt with _every_ movement, or just when he tries to struggle? Could they really be that cruel?

It’s a stupid question. Of course they could.

He shakes with the effort to hold back his pained cries. This is bullshit, _absolute bullshit_ —

Abruptly, he hears something. Two voices are becoming more clear as they come down the corridor. The Soldier’s breath catches, quieting to barely anything at all, as he strains to hear the conversation. He recognizes the two voices—one, his handler. The other, his handler’s handler—Mr. Pierce.

He almost laughs, but it’s not very funny. Pierce really does have Rumlow tangled up in strings.

“I was doing something important, Rumlow,” Pierce is saying, sounding very annoyed. “You want Project Insight to go through? It’ll never happen while Captain Rogers and his band of idiots are still parading around SHIELD.”

“We can get rid of them, sir,” Rumlow says.

There’s a bark of cold, sharp laughter. “Really? With what hitman? Our Asset, who listens so well?”

“We still have people on the inside,” Rumlow says. “They could handle it. They’re good at their jobs.”

“There’s no way for us to communicate this to them now,” Pierce says. “They have their orders. They don’t need more on their plate because you’re too incompetent to pick up the slack.”

There’s silence for a long second before Rumlow speaks, his voice tentative. “There’s a spell,” he says. “The Siren Song. It could make him… easier to deal with. I’ve wanted to suggest it for a while.”

There’s no hesitation to Pierce’s voice when he says, “I’m not doing that.”

“Why not?” Rumlow almost sounds offended. The Soldier has to hold in a laugh. “He’ll be the perfect soldier, sir.”

“Because I’m not a fucking _demon_ , like him,” Pierce growls. “I don’t dabble in magic.”

There’s more silence for a moment. Every man holds his breath. He’s never heard someone use that word—demon—to describe witches and familiars before, and it makes him feel oddly sick.

“I could do it,” Rumlow says, and he sounds slightly defensive. “But that would mean that he listens directly to me. Not you.”

“And _you_ listen to _me_ ,” Pierce says. “Right?”

“Right,” Rumlow says. There’s no hesitation.

Finally, after a delibrativative silence, Pierce says, “You do it. I’m not touching it. Go through with the spell. You have control over him, but if you use him against me, I will cut out your fucking tongue. Then you’ll both have outlived your usefulness.”

There are retreating footsteps. The Soldier has a sick feeling in his stomach—the enchanted chains aren’t going to be the worst of his punishment.

+++

## THE SIREN’S SONG

###  _used to enchant the user’s speech. the words that pass your lips will be as sweet and tempting as a siren’s song._

 

##### MATERIALS NEEDED

  * Bowl of fresh seawater, any size.
  * Blood from the intended user.
  * Ceremonial knife.
  * Chalk, for sigil.



##### DIRECTIONS

  1. Prepare the ceremonial knife. Make sure it is clean and that you have the bowl of seawater ready.
  2. Draw the sigil. It should look like this:



       3. Place your bowl in the center of the sigil. Don’t spill any water, or you will need to start all over again with fresh water and a new sigil.  
       4. Stand near your bowl and take the knife and cut a long, clean slice across the palm of your dominant hand. Let yourself bleed into the water for no longer than ten seconds.  
       5. If you must, wrap your hand quickly with a bandage.  
       6. Cup your non-dominant hand in the water and drink some of the water. This will give you the power of the Siren. Do NOT splash the water onto your face or drink from the bowl itself.  
       7. Choose several words that will ignite your will when spoken to the object/thing that you want to control. Be wary of their order, because they must be in this order to work.  
       8. Say these words to the intended subject and then state your will. The person/object will, in a sense, snap to attention. This spell will only work on one object or person. If you want to enchant something else, you must do the spell over again. When you are finished, tell it/them “goodnight.”

+++

He watches as Rumlow begins the spell through the bars of the cell. He draws with chalk on the floor, a bowl of water and a knife sitting nearby. When he finishes with the sigil, he places the bowl in the middle of it, careful not to spill. Then he stands, knife at the ready, and slices it across his right hand — a clean, even cut from end to end. He clenches his hand into a fist, watching as the blood drips from his palm and into the bowl for a long moment. The water begins to bubble, and the Soldier knows that the spell is progressing in the way it is intended to. With a sick feeling in his stomach, the Soldier watches as Rumlow bends down to gather some of the water in his still-bleeding hand and raise it to his lips to drink.

He sighs, contented,  like the water has refreshed him. He feels sickened as Rumlow rises again, letting the rest of the water drip back into the bowl.

“ _Soldat_ ,” Rumlow says, startling him. The Soldier sits still and listens, because he has no other choice:

“Longing. Rusted. Seventeen. Daybreak. Furnace. Nine. Benign. Homecoming. One. Freight car.”

The Soldier tenses with every word said. He waits for more to come, but with that last word— _f_ _reight car_ — nothing more is said. Unconsciously, he lifts himself from the floor of his cell to stand at attention. The chains burn him as he stands but he can’t help himself. They burn so badly that tears form in his eyes and roll down his face but he just stands there, stands with his hands clasped behind his back, his feet spread shoulder-length apart, his back straight, his chin up. Like a good soldier.

Rumlow smiles, pleased, and says, “Good morning, Soldier.”

The Soldier works his mouth open, says, “Ready to comply.” The words taste bitter in his mouth, but at the same time, he does it without thinking. It’s like, when Rumlow says anything, has an order, anything… it’s like the Soldier can’t help but listen to him. Not only that, but _want_ to fulfill his demands, complete his wishes… even if there’s a small voice in his head saying, _Wait, what are you doing?_

He feels sick. His stomach churns but he can’t even fight it, which he hates. He feels drunk. He feels like a puppet.

“Oh, kid,” Rumlow says, a slow grin creeping onto his face. “We’re gonna have so much fun.”

+++

Hands slip from the exposed beam in the low ceiling. He falls to the floor, thoroughly exhausted. Rumlow has been making him do chin-ups in his cell for the better part of three hours now. The fucking bastard just stands outside of his cell, smug as fuck where he watches without touching him.

He doesn’t even have enough fluids to sweat or cry anymore.

“Water,” he rasps.  

“No,” Rumlow says. “You don’t drink until I say you can.”

“Sir,” he says, desperate.

Rumlow laughs in his face. “If you can’t handle the punishment, then maybe you shouldn’t do the crime.”

The Soldier looks up at Rumlow with difficulty. He feels… dry. He feels like his blood has concentrated into bitter, iron sludge in his veins, like the Sahara has taken up residence in his mouth.

He watches Rumlow bring a water bottle to his mouth and take a long drink.

And that’s it, that’s the last fucking straw — the Soldier is up on his feet and lunging a hand through the bars before Rumlow can even move out of the way, before he can even blink. The Soldier has a hand around his throat, squeezing hard. His metal hand. It feels good to do this — after all the pain and suffering, after the electric shocks and the sludgy taste of meal-replacement bars, after all the sweat and tears, after almost freezing to death — it feels good. It feels right.

“Put me _down_ , Soldier,” Rumlow gasps.

And — no, no, no no no no _no_. He doesn’t want to do that. He — his muscles work against his will. He lowers Rumlow down to the floor and lets go.

Rumlow coughs, even though it looks like he was trying really hard not to, his hand going up to massage his throat muscles.

“You’re a real piece of fucking work, kid,” Rumlow says.

The Soldier says nothing.

Rumlow huffs a laugh that has no humor and picks up the walkie-talkie that’s clipped to his belt.

“Wipe him. And start over.”

+++

The next time he wakes, he’s in a hospital bed, wire running down his arms. An IV hangs above his head, and a water bottle sits on the table next to his bed.

His body feels heavy and his teeth ache. His head feels light and heavy at the same time. He stares ahead. A part of him wonders if it’s okay that he doesn’t remember anything, and then pushes that thought aside. It doesn’t really matter.

A man enters the room, carrying a manila folder. He is tall and broad, wears a black shirt, black pants, black boots. Even his hair is black, and his eyes are such a dark brown that it makes it seem as if he has no iris. He is quite dark.

“Oh, good,” the Dark Man says. “You’re awake. _Soldat_.”

He perks up a little when he hears that, though he’s not sure why. He blinks at the Dark Man owlishly.

“Listen close,” he says. His heavy eyebrows are slightly mesmerizing. “Longing. Rusted. Seventeen. Daybreak. Furnace. Nine. Benign. Homecoming. One. Freight car. Good morning, Soldier.”

He swallows the lump in his throat. “Ready to comply,” he says, softly.

“I have a mission for you, Soldier,” he says, grinning. His smile is sharp as he offers the manila folder to him. “I think you’re going to like it.”

That’s what they call him, then — Soldier. “Yes, sir,” he says, and takes the offered folder from the Dark Man’s hands and obediently tears into its contents. The names of his three targets are right there, on the first page. Natasha Romanoff, Samuel Wilson, Steven Rogers.

He stares at the names a little longer than necessary before he tilts his head up to look at him. “What’s the plan?”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> one more chapter after this one of bucky's POV and then we move back to steve's until the very end. it'll be okay children :(


	14. Presque Vu

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Hey pals!! It's the last chapter from Bucky's POV! Next chapter we'll go back to Steve's for the rest of the story and then we'll move on to the next part of the series.
> 
> So this chapter is kinda long and idk if it's confusing or not, so pls leave me a comment if you need me to clarify anything. Also I'm moving into my college dorm soon!!! AAAAAAHHHHHHHH

When he wakes up, Pierce tells him something that he doesn’t quite understand at first: the mind forgets, but the body remembers.

The Soldier finds this a strange thing to say. How can the body remember something that the mind doesn’t?

But when it’s nighttime and he can’t sleep, he’s overcome by some strange instinct to pace his room — he can’t remember where he picked up his habits, but he goes through the motions without even thinking. His skin is crisscrossed with scars that he doesn’t remember getting, burn marks that are just healing, frostbite scars, scars from knife wounds that seem fairly new but not fresh.

The mind forgets, but the body remembers. The mind cannot scar; it cannot bleed, it does not feel. His body is a map of his journey, a physical record of his life.

New instincts are carved in. He feels it in his blood, in his bones. Every atom lights up with sensation. He knows now why it’s called muscle memory—because when the mind fails, the hands know.

The gun is warm, like liquid in his hands. His fingers wrap around it, molding together like clay—a perfect fit. It begs the question: was the gun made for him, or was he made for the gun?

He locks and loads the gun with military efficiency. Pierce and Rumlow seem pleased with him as they watch on, talking quietly in the corner.

“He wasn’t like this last time,” Rumlow observes. “He was sloppy.”

“The other Wolf Spiders didn’t mix well with him,” Pierce says. “He only ever got along with the blond one. What number was he?”

“Seven,” the Dark Man — Rumlow, he introduced himself as — says. “He died during the weed-out.”

“A shame,” Pierce says. “He was an excellent sniper. And fast, too.” He takes a deep breath and sighs. “He was afraid to use his own power, though. Even though though we were so generous to give them to him.”

Rumlow nods. “His sister was upset.”

“It’s not like she didn’t see it coming,” Pierce remarks, and Rumlow cracks a smile and snorts. “And it was only ever one or the other. Seven was a good shot, and he was fast, but he wasn’t a match for the Soldier’s strength. And the other one—Four?—he was always too eager to fight. He never stopped to look at a situation to figure out how to best handle it. He just wanted to use brute force.”

“Only problem with this one is that he’s a little willful,” Rumlow says. He crosses his arms over his chest, like he’s remembering something distasteful.

“Doesn’t seem to be anymore, though,” Pierce says, and starts heading towards the Soldier, who is finishing packing his gear.

“Are you ready?” Pierce asks him. “The helicopter will be here soon. I want to show you something before you go.”

The Soldier looks around, trying to catalogue what he’s missed. He’s not going on a sniper mission, which are his specialty, so he doesn’t need a long-range rifle. He has a few handguns in holsters at his sides, a few knives hidden strategically around his body. He has his mask, his goggles, a few specialty weapons that he doubts he’ll have to use.

It’s been a week since the mission briefing. They’ve trained him all week with his team, given him the run-down on what he’s supposed to do. It’s last-minute, yes, but the Soldier is prepared. He believes that this mission will go as planned.

“Remember,” Pierce had said, “you just want to capture them, not kill them. Especially this one.” He pointed to the name — Steven Rogers, a grainy black-and-white photo accompanying the file: it’s a candid of a caucasian man with short, light hair. “We need him for information. He has something I want.”

A week seems so long ago now. He’s been waiting for a mission for a while now. Before Rumlow started casting him in the freezing spell, the Soldier would pace for hours and hours. Finally Rumlow got annoyed with his restlessness. The cold feels like a sweet embrace, but he can’t sleep when he’s in the spell. He just lies awake with his eyes forced open, watching the same spot on the wall for hours and hours.

The Soldier just looks up at Pierce and nods. He’s sure he has everything he needs — more than enough, really.

“Come with me, then,” Pierce says, gesturing the the door. He’s careful not to touch the Soldier as he makes his way past him.

Pierce leads him out the door and through a hallway. They take an elevator to a floor that requires Pierce to punch in a code. The Soldier watches, silent and still.

The ride in the elevator takes a long time; the Soldier wonders how far down the floor is. He’s just getting the courage to ask when the elevator stops and the doors open.

Pierce walks out, not asking the Soldier to follow. He falls in step behind him.

The room is cavernous. High ceilings disappear into the darkness, the air is heavy with humidity, and the walls are made concrete.

There is a machine in the middle of the floor. Several tubes and pipes spout from it. A few reclining chairs are sat next to it — it looks like a chair that one would see in a dentist’s office. The Soldier’s stomach churns at the sight of it.

“This is Project Insight,” Pierce says. His voice echoes throughout the room. “A mixture of magic, science, and math — something the world has never seen before. You know how well technology mixes with magic. We have finally overcome these barriers, and we’re ready to share them with the world.

“We have scientifically enhanced Seers to be more powerful than just your average fortune teller,” he continues with a charming smile. “Our Seers can look into the future. Instead of seeing the futures of everyone they meet, they see the future of the entire world’s population. If there’s a threat to Hydra, we will know immediately. We send the Wolf Spiders to eliminate it, before it even happens.”

The Soldier feels a shiver go down his spine. He looks at the machine and the chairs and feels like he’s looking into both his past and his future.

“Of course, they can only see so far,” Pierce says. “So we can’t just take their word for it and write it all down. That would be the ideal situation. But we’re working on it.”

The Soldier remains quiet, staring at the machinery, the grotesqueness of it. It sends a chill through his body, but he can’t seem to remember why. He hovers a few feet away from the chairs, keeping a safe distance.

“Congress hasn’t voted on it yet,” Pierce continues. “But they will vote in my favor.” He turns to the Soldier. “Despite what you think, I do not want to take this world by force. I would rather have quiet. I would rather be patient. Rumlow wants to use fear, but Hydra is not meant to be feared. It is meant to be embraced. It’ll only work if everyone believes in it.”

The Soldier swallows. “What am I, then?” he asks, feeling ashamed of himself. “I am an agent of fear.”

Pierce shakes his head. “Right now, maybe,” he allows, “but with Insight, you’re not going to be feared. You’re going to be doing the Lord’s work. You’ll be revered, Soldier. They’ll love you.”

The Soldier doesn’t know if he believes that. He knows how he appears — dressed in black and silent as the night, tall, burly, with a metal arm to boot. He knows he looks strange, like a monster pieced together with spare parts.

Pierce sets his mouth in a straight line and looks at the Soldier with a curious expression. The Soldier can’t decipher what emotion he seems to be feeling.

“It’s almost time for you to go,” Pierce says. “You should get to the roof.”

The Soldier nods and makes his way to the elevator, feeling strange. He’s not sure if he’s ashamed of himself. He wants to be in Pierce’s good graces. This is what he was made for. He doesn’t want to disappoint.

He makes his way up to the roof alone, standing by himself in the elevator. The ride up is a long one, giving him a few minutes to think.

He wonders how Rumlow and Pierce manage to work together. Rumlow is a forest fire of a man, burning angry and fast. Pierce is like water — patient and steadfast. They’re polar opposites and yet they are a team. The Soldier doesn’t understand. Perhaps sharing the same dream is enough.

Thinking about Pierce strikes something into his heart — he doesn’t know what. Fear? Admiration? It’s hard to think with that man in the room. His air of confidence and power turns the brain to mush. It’s… strange, to say the least.

Pierce is more dangerous for his patience. Fire can burn and char, yes, but water can cut through mountains. It shapes the earth. It steals breath away. It seems harmless, but there is nothing more dangerous than something with endless patience. There is nothing more dangerous than something that has the ability to give life, and just as quickly take it away.

The elevator opens and the air immediately starts to whip around him. The helicopter is there, just waiting for him outside. Rumlow is already waiting, dressed in dark clothes for the mission. He beckons the Soldier forward, mouthing _Come on, already!_

+++

The mission is simple.

There are six agents already in the building. They’ve been in custody for months now, receiving their orders from several deep-undercover Hydra agents. While SHIELD is already infiltrated by Hydra, he knows that not everyone will let it go completely without a fight.

“SHIELD needs to fall so that Hydra can take its rightful place,” Pierce had told him. “There are people standing in my way. If Hydra is ever to hold ground with the public, they need to be removed.”

He just needs to get into the building, get his targets, get them into a truck, and leave.

“I want this done quietly,” Pierce had said. “I don’t want to see this on the news tomorrow. You do your job and you leave. That’s all. Nothing more. Understand?”

The Soldier just nodded. He understood perfectly.

The helicopter lands on the rooftop, the Soldier’s team following behind. While walking in through the front door would make the Soldier’s job faster, they can’t risk civilians seeing a bunch of heavily-armed men wearing all black running into a building. Besides, the doors are all open for them — they’ve been welcomed inside like old friends. Which, they are, kind of.

The rest of the team are doing a mission separate from The Soldier’s, which he has no direct knowledge of. He thinks that they’re perhaps taking over the SHIELD agency altogether, but he’s not sure.

It’s the Soldier’s understanding that Rogers is the main threat to Hydra right now — that he’s been asking the wrong questions, that he’s been digging too deep into the archives, that he’s drawing connections that are best left alone. Hydra is not meant to be secret forever, the Soldier knows, but he knows that truth coming from the wrong mouth can leave someone confused and afraid — and fear makes people do silly things sometimes.

The public might not like Hydra if Steven Rogers is the one to talk about it first. Rogers is by no means a well-known personality, but he could very well _find_ someone who shares his views and has the ability to deal the blows. He could ruin a lot of progress. He could make or break whether or not Insight gains traction in Congress.

Or, that’s what Pierce had told him. The Soldier knows very little about this man or his acquaintances — just what he’s seen in his file.

All in all, Rogers seems like the least threatening of his targets. While he’s big and strong, Natasha Romanoff has years of arms training, a brief stint in the KGB, looks about as cuddly as a sea urchin, and is a familiar to boot. She’s an assassin if the Soldier’s ever seen one.

Samuel Wilson, too, doesn’t seem like an easy target—two tours with the military, a good and well-respected pilot, and has plenty of arms training. While the Soldier doesn’t have much intel on him, he knows, somehow, that this is Rogers’ right-hand man.

Half of his team goes to shut down the electricity to the lower floors. That’s where the six agents are being held — one of the sub-levels of the building. They’re supposed to have done half of the Soldier’s job: lure all his targets to one spot, and perhaps incapacitate them, if able. It’s not a surefire method, and he’s unsure if Romanoff will be with them — he’s been warned that she likes to do things herself sometimes — but considering how tight-knit the group sounds, and that they already seem to be distrustful of outsiders, it’s possible that they’ll all be in the same spot together.

He’s been told that the Hydra agents in custody don’t really need saving — they are special. They’re good soldiers, and they can handle themselves.

“They’re familiars, just like you,” Pierce had told him. “Well — they’re human, but we operated on them like we did with our Seers. Opened up their souls a little bit. They can transform into animals just like you can. Of course, they’re not as good as natural-born familiars, but we have to start somewhere. They can only transform into insects for now. But we’ll change that soon.”  

The Soldier wonders what he means by “opened up their souls.” He wonders if it was painful.

The tricky part is this: getting to the sub-level. Soon, the electricity will be cut and then he’ll only have two options — climbing down the elevator shaft, or going through the vents.

The comm in his ear tells him that Rogers has left the basement to get Romanoff, who is on the floor directly below them. The electricity will be shut off soon, and he needs to act fast.

His team opens the elevator doors for him — he stares down the elevator shaft, a twinge in his gut. He climbs down the wire to stand on the roof of the elevator cab. There’s an emergency hatch that he’ll climb through when it finally comes to a stop. He just hopes that he’s not doing something stupid.

The comm in his ear tells him that the six agents have already incapacitated Wilson and changed into their familiar forms — six little cockroaches, hiding somewhere in the sub-level to surprise Romanoff and Rogers when they return. While Pierce is planning on making their familiar forms bigger, the Soldier finds their small forms advantageous in the present moment.

“Rogers and Romanoff are getting in the elevator,” his comm buzzes. “Brace yourself, Soldier.”

The Soldier holds tight to the floor as the elevator starts descending downwards. It’s surprisingly loud, the shaft echoing with mechanical sounds as the pulley clicks and winds, dropping them slowly downwards. He makes sure his facemask and goggles are in place one last time.

Eventually, the elevator comes to a stop. The Soldier waits three minutes before opening the hatch. He drops to the floor and sees that the red emergency lights are on within the elevator cab — the electricity must be off.

Sadly, that means the doors are closed. The Soldier digs his fingers into the seam where the sliding doors meet, and pushes apart with all his might. The metal arm makes it easy, and he slips out into the hallway. The red lights make it easier for him to go unnoticed. Romanoff and Rogers have already made their way down the hallway, but the Soldier readies a tranquilizer gun anyway, holding it up, ready to shoot.

 

He almost — _almost_ — gets the jump on them.

He’s down the hallway. The door to the holding cells are all opened, and the Soldier has slipping into the room, unnoticed. Wilson is on the floor, Romanoff is inspecting the far cells one last time, and Rogers is standing protectively over Wilson’s unconscious body. He has a blow to his head. Messy — but it does the job.

He tiptoes towards Rogers while Romanoff’s back is turned, ready to clap a hand over his mouth and send him down in a chokehold. He would have done it, too, if Romanoff hadn’t turned just in time to catch him.

“Behind you!”

Rogers turns and the Soldier is struck by a strange feeling. The picture in Rogers’ file did not do him justice. Sure, all the same features are there, but now that he’s right in front of him, he feels like he’s seen him before. Like he saw him on the train or had a conversation with him in passing. Maybe he just has one of those faces.

It’s just a fleeting thought, because then there’s a fist flying through the air, and the Soldier catches it in his metal hand, and Rogers’ eyes go impossibly wide.

“You’re—” he starts, but the Soldier doesn’t wait for him to finish. He pushes Rogers away, sending him sprawling to the floor.

Romanoff comes flying at him, her legs kicking. The Soldier is able to block most of her attacks with his forearms, but she’s a powerful one, despite her size. It fucking hurts.

The Soldier holds up his gun and shoots — he misses the first time when she ducks out of the way, and he curses under his breath. He can’t afford to waste these things.

The other agents are taking their sweet time coming out of hiding. He hopes that they come out soon, because he’s afraid that Wilson will be stirring soon, and he’s not sure if he can handle being triple-teamed.

In the far corner of the room, he sees two agents transform from their familiar forms. They seem to be running straight for Wilson, probably to take him to the van waiting for them. The Soldier doesn’t acknowledge them, just keeps on fighting.

Rogers is back up and the Soldier has to admit that he underestimated him. His fighting style is superb, but it’s nothing the Soldier hasn’t dealt with before. They’re pretty evenly matched, and with Romanoff on his side, the Soldier is struggling. Finally, though, the Soldier lands a solid kick to Romanoff’s side, sending her to the floor. The Soldier quickly gets his gun and shoots, landing a tranquilizer right in her shoulder. She tries to stand, staggers, and falls straight back to the floor.

There’s a line of  four more cockroaches on the floor — the last of the agents, in their familiar forms. When Rogers lands a particularly hard punch square in the middle of Rogers’ chest, one of the agents transforms, ready to fight alongside him. The Soldier just waves her off.

“I’ve got this,” he growls to her in Russian. “Get the redhead.”

Rogers makes a dive, noticing now that the cockroaches are, in fact, the disappeared Hydra agents. He seems to be grabbing for Romanoff’s ankles, but it’s really no use — the Hydra agent gets to her first, throwing Romanoff over her shoulder and running for the exit.

The Soldier tackles Rogers before he can make another grab, and the pair goes sprawling to the ground. Rogers ends up on top of him, knees bracketing his hips, using his whole weight to keep him in place. He’s trying to wrestle the gun away from him, but the Soldier has a solid grip with his metal hand, and he’s not letting go anytime soon. Rogers growls angrily. The Soldier sees his fist fly up and come back down, catching him square in the jaw.

His mask flies away from his face, clattering on the ground. It’s too far away to get back to him. He’ll just have to do without it for now. He squirms, trying to throw Rogers off of him, when he realizes that Rogers isn’t putting up a fight anymore. He’s staring at the Soldier, mouth dropped open and eyes wide.

“Bucky?” Rogers asks. He’s staring at the Soldier with a curious look in his eyes, with an emotion that the Soldier doesn’t recognize.

That name.

His heart is beating in his chest. He can hear it in his ears. Something tugs in the pit of his stomach. His body feels like one half of a whole. Like an electric current that is travelling nowhere, hitting a dead end.

He realizes that Rogers must be talking to him. Something kicks in his chest, and thinks that it must be his heart beating double time.

“Who the hell is Bucky?” the Soldier asks. Rogers is distracted, and he has a mission to complete. He gets a leg up and kicks Rogers straight in the chest, and then raises his gun to shoot while his guard is dropped.


	15. Chance Meeting (Pt. 2)

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hello children! sorry it's been so long! it's been a busy few weeks! things are finally starting to settle down though and i thought it would be cool to actually give you guys a chapter. i kept changing things around in this chapter and that's why it's taken so long to get it finished, but it's finally here! yay!!!!!! the next chapter is getting a little long and I'm not sure whether or not i should split it, but it's almost done regardless. I'll probably post it very soon :^)

###### STEVE

That punch must have knocked something loose in his head, because this can’t be happening.

As his vision starts darkening at the edges, he thinks that perhaps this isn’t real—perhaps this is some terrible dream, because he doesn’t want to believe it. But then, he doesn’t know why he’d dream a world where Bucky is _alive,_ but hates him.

That’s the thing that he just can’t get himself past. Bucky is alive. Bucky is _here_ . Bucky’s alive and even though he doesn’t remember Steve, he can’t slip away from that sinking feeling of guilt when he realizes that Bucky has been alive this entire time and instead of trying to _save_ him or _do something_ about it, Steve’s just been wallowing in his own self-pity, trying to forget the memory of Bucky and move on.

He reaches out with the last of his strength before the tranquilizer knocks him out.

+++

The first time he wakes up, it’s in the back of a van. His head jostles from side to side as he doesn’t have the strength to steady it, and his vision is blurry when he tries to focus on something, anything — but the only thing that he can really comprehend is the loudness of the motor, the darkness of the cab that he’s sitting in, before he blacks out again.

The second time he wakes up, he finds himself being dragged, upright, out of the van and dropped on the ground. His head hits the concrete and his world goe out of focus for just a second, blurring and deblurring, until he passes out again.

The nice thing about being shot with a tranq is that he falls into a deep sort of sleep, with no dreams to plague him or hurt him. It feels good to just sleep for once, even considering the circumstances.

The last time he wakes up, he’s in a grayish, icy-cold room. The overhead lights flicker and buzz, giving off an empty fluorescent glow. His eyes crack open, heavy still with the remaining grogginess that comes with being drugged. He’s face-down on a table, his cheek pressed against the cool, smooth metal. His head is throbbing with the worst headache he’s felt since he started taking the Serum.

Grunting, he sits upright in his chair, peeling his face from the table. He realizes that he’s trapped, his hands handcuffed behind him. He pulls a little, tests his restraints. If he put some effort in, he might — _might_ — be able to break it, but that’s not first priority right now.

His first priority is the man that is standing across the table from him — one of the agents that they’d had in custody. The only one to have ever spoken out of the six of them. His hair is combed neatly, now that he’s left the custody of SHIELD. And he’s wearing glasses, Steve realizes. They make his eyes look too big.

“Ah,” he says. Steve is surprised that he’s the one initiating the actual conversation. “Joining the living, now, Captain?”

“Where am I?” Steve asks, the fog starting to clear from his head a little. “Where…”

The agent shakes his head and chuckles. “I’m afraid I can’t tell you that, Captain.”

As his head becomes clearer, a red-hot anger fills Steve’s chest. His friends — and Bucky — he doesn’t know what to feel except outrage.

Clenching his jaw, he juts his chin up and demands, “Where’s Bucky? Where is he?”

“What does it matter?” the agent taunts. “It’s not like he would remember you anyway.”

Steve tries to get up but his handcuffs keep him in place. He huffs and sits back, blood boiling.

“What did you do to him?” Steve growls.

“We made him amazing,” the agent says, a serpentine smile on his face, thin and lipless. He spreads his arms, as if gesturing in wonder, and laughs quietly. “Do you know what the best part is?”

Steve sets his jaw and doesn’t answer, glaring hard enough to put a hole in the wall.

“We didn’t even have to _do_ anything,” the agent says, grinning. “The pieces were all there. We just took his memories and pointed him in the right direction. Everything else, he did himself. He was already half a killer. He was a natural with a gun.”

“Shut up,” Steve says.

But the agent just laughs. “No need to get angry, Captain.”

“What do you want?” he asks. “You must be keeping me alive for some reason.”

The agent looks at him with clear, brown eyes. He looks different when he believes he has the upper hand.

“We hear that you have something that we want,” the agent says.

 _Haven’t you taken enough from me?_ Steve doesn’t say.

“Yeah? What’s that?” Steve asks, leaning back in his chair.

“The Serum,” the agent says, leaning forward and putting his hands on the edges of the table. “That is something that our leader would put to good use.”

Steve laughs. “You can go fuck yourself if you think I would give you the Serum.”

“Well, Captain Rogers,” the agent says, straightening up. “If I can’t convince you, perhaps James Barnes can?”

A shiver zips down Steve’s spine. “Don’t you fucking touch him,” he says. “I swear to God, I’ll—”

“You’ll what?” the agent asks. “You’ll sit in that chair and whine about it some more?”

Steve bites his tongue so hard he’s amazed that he doesn’t draw blood. “You’d be amazed at what I’ll do,” Steve settles on, clenching his jaw.

The agent just laughs. “You’re terrifying, Captain,” he chuckles. “Do you know what kind of reputation you have?”

Steve sits there, waiting for him to continue.

“You’re _soft,_ ” the agent says, but he spits the word out like it’s an insult. “You had months to grill us for information. You could have used any sort of manipulation on us, you could have hurt us. You could have killed us. And why didn’t you? You had every reason to be angry.”

Steve’s chest gets tighter with each word the agent says, his hands clenching into fists behind his back. He just sits there.

“We took your Bucky Barnes away from you, Captain Rogers. Why didn’t you kill us?” The agent shakes his head and sighs, disappointed. “Because you’re _weak_. Not because you didn’t think it was right. Not because you needed us for information. You were just too much of a fucking coward to go through with it. And now look where you are.”

Steve presses his lips into a firm line, trying to make sure they won’t quiver.

“You’re spineless,” the agent continues. “Whatever happened to Barnes happened because of you. I hope you know that.”

The agent grits his teeth and twists his head at a sound, pressing the com in his ear a little closer with his index finger, trying to hear better. Someone must be telling him something.

He curses under his breath in Russian, and says to Steve, “I’ll be back.”

The man opens the door and goes to exit, but before he can, someone that Steve can’t see apprehends him.

“What—!” the agent says, and then the door swings shut.

Against his will, Steve’s heart starts beating faster. There’s a scuffle outside — Steve can hear the sound of blows landing, a few muffled grunts, a strangled yell. And then, silence. This newcomer, whoever they are — Steve really hope they’re on his side.

A head pokes into the room, half-covered with dark goggles and a thick helmet. Steve clenches his jaw apprehensively, but relaxes when the newcomer takes off their helmet — _her_ helmet.

“Darling,” Peggy says, a few strands of her brown hair falling loose, “you’ve really gone and gotten yourself into trouble now, haven’t you?”

“Peggy,” he breathes, and he almost wants to laugh with how relieved he feels. “What are you doing here?”

“Saving you,” she says, smirking. “Just like old times.” She saunters over, pulling out a small, sealed tube from her pocket. Steve recognizes it as one of Peggy’s homemade potions.

“Hold still,” she says, and uncaps the bottle. She steps around Steve and he feels her take his handcuffs into her palm. She pours the contents onto the chain of the handcuffs, and immediately he feels the metal dissolve into nothing.

He pulls his hands away, rubbing his wrists to get the feeling back. He rolls his shoulders and tries to get the crick out of his neck.

“You can stretch later, Rogers,” she says, affixing the helmet back on her head. “Everyone else is waiting for you.”

Steve gasps. “You came to get me _last_?” he says, mock offense in his voice. “How dare you.”

“You’re lucky I didn’t leave you here,” she scoffs. “You’re more trouble than you’re worth.”

She steps outside and Steve sees the agent, crumpled pathetically on the ground. His nose is bloody and his face is smooth and blank. Before he can give it another thought, Steve leans down and scoops him up, throwing him over his shoulder.

“What are you doing?” Peggy hisses.

“He has information,” Steve says. “He was sent to kidnap Bucky, he knew the attack on SHIELD was coming. Hell, he practically warned me.”

She makes a face like she’s smelled something sour. “Whatever you say, Steve. Follow me.”

She starts making her way down a long hallway, and Steve finally gets a look at the facility that they’ve kept him in. High ceilings, gray-blue in the dying light.

“Don’t trust anything you see,” Peggy says. “Nothing, got it? These assholes are really fucking versatile.”

“How so?” Steve asks.

They slow as they reach a corner, looking around the wall before Peggy calls it clear.

She twists her mouth in apparent frustration as she says, “They’re familiars.”

Steve is taken aback. “I didn’t resonate with any of them,” he says. “How can they be familiars?”

“They’re different,” she says. “They’ve been genetically engineered or enhanced or _something_ — they’re humans with their own familiar forms. They have some strange soul connection that most humans don’t have. I’ll explain it to you when we get out of here.”

They head down the hallways, making turns that Peggy dictates to be necessary. Every hallway looks the same to Steve, so he’s glad that she’s here to help him, because he’d have no idea what he’s doing.

They start passing people, crumpled in the middle of the hallways, strewn across the floors, spread-eagle, face-down, snoring away.

“What happened here?” Steve asks, as he steps over the sleeping body of a man who’s clutching his gun to his chest like it’s a teddy bear.

Peggy’s mouth twists. They turn at another intersection of corridors. “They’re just asleep. But only for another three minutes, so we have to hurry.”

“What do you mean?”

“I mean,” she says, “I put something in the vents that made all the humans fall asleep. Didn’t affect this guy right away because he was in the interrogation room with you, but when he came out into the hallway with me, he passed out almost right away.”

They make it down a few more hallways until they get to a stairwell and start to ascend, to the roof. The concrete walls make their steps echo, and Steve has to start jogging when Peggy increases her pace. How many goddamn floors are there?

“We have about a minute. You need to be careful when they wake up,” she says. “These guys are special.”

Steve doesn’t like the sound of that. “Special how?”

“Their familiar forms are hard to see — cockroaches. Rats. Mice. Small, small creatures. We don’t know if it’s because they aren’t strong enough to become bigger creatures, or what. Come on, we’re almost there.”

“So we can’t resonate with them,” he says, “so they won’t alert us that they’re there. And then, they’re small enough that we probably wouldn’t see them to begin with?”

“That’s right,” Peggy agrees.

“Fantastic,” Steve mutters.

It’s only a few more floors to get to the top floor, to the roof, where — depending by the dull roar coming from the other side — their ride is waiting for them.

“Did you bring a helicopter?” Steve asks, continuing to climb up the stairs.

“A quinjet,” she corrects. “I had to bring something that wouldn’t be so easy for the familiars to climb into.” She’s breathing heavy. She hasn’t taken a break since they started climbing. “Something that could hover.”

Steve feels a little sick at the thought — the idea that the Hydra agents could be there and they wouldn’t even know, crawling around, waiting to strike. To take everything from him again.

“Ready?” she asks.

Steve takes a deep breath and says, “Of course.”

Peggy grins at him and kicks the door open. There’s three guards waiting for them — otherwise occupied. Natasha is there, on the roof, holding her own; when she sees them, she just yells, “About damn time!”

Natasha is a fantastic fighter, but it seems that she was waiting for backup to arrive. Peggy jumps right in, fists at the ready, and Steve knows that he is not otherwise needed.

“We’ll hold them off!” Peggy shouts. “Get in before he wakes up!” she adds, referring to the still-sleeping Hydra agent over his shoulder.

Steve takes her advice and makes a run for the quinjet, which is hovering a safe distance above the ground — high enough that rats or cockroaches couldn’t get in, but low enough that Steve can throw the sleeping Hydra agent in with no problem, before jumping in himself.

Sam, already in the quinjet, takes one look at Steve and yells, “What the hell were you thinking, dumbass?”

Good question, really. Steve doesn’t know what the fuck is going on, really, other than that this back-and-forth of captured-free-captured is probably getting a little tiring for this guy.

Well, doesn’t matter now. This guy has information about Bucky, and he’s not about to let him go now, not after what he admitted to know. Steve doesn’t know how they got their info, or how this guy knew what was happening with Bucky while he was in custody, but he’s not letting this guy go again, not until he gives Steve the information he wants.

He looks at Sam. “I don’t know how they get their info. Maybe someone at the SHIELD HQ was giving them orders, maybe not. But either way, I want him to tell me what the hell is going on.”

Steve sees that Clint is there, piloting the jet while Nat and Peggy finish up their fight. Steve goes to put the Hydra agent in a seat, trying to think of a place where he’s not likely to escape. His best bet is keeping this guy knocked out until they get to wherever the fuck they’re going so he doesn’t slip through his restraints — _fuck_.

Behind Steve, Natasha and Peggy are jumping into the quinjet through the open door. Sam shuts the door behind them and the quinjet takes off, leaving behind three very upset Hydra agents, shaking their fists on the roof.

“Where are we going?” Steve asks, once he’s got the Hydra agent secured.

“Stark’s,” Peggy says.

“That’s not a hiding place,” Steve says.

“No,” Natasha agrees, “but even Hydra isn’t stupid enough to try to hold a public attack on a tower in the middle of New York City.”

“Well, considering they’ve got an army of rats and insects on their side, I’m not sure that’s true anymore,” Steve says.

“Trust me,” Peggy says, and Steve does, even though he doesn’t know anymore.


	16. Judgement.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> long chapter coming up! i split the chapter into two because it was getting VERY LONG. so expect another chapter very soon. if anything's confusing or if there are any glaring errors, leave a comment!!

Stark Tower feels strange; like it’s not real, like it’s a mirage of an oasis in the middle of the desert.

JARVIS continues to carry out mundane command like there’s nothing wrong. Tony is as scatterbrained as ever, Pepper is prim and proper.

“There’s someone here for you,” Peggy tells him.

Steve is sitting in the common room, staring at his feet, hands clasped together. He looks up when he hears Peggy speak.

She’s wearing plain civilian clothes, her hair loose around her shoulders. It reminds him of the first time he introduced her to Bucky; Steve had just started having feelings for him, and he’d still been half hung-up on Peggy. Never mind the fact that they had ended their engagement years ago: part of him thought he would never get over her, because she had been such a force in his life, but that had changed when he started spending more time with Bucky.

Bucky’s face had shifted, gone carefully blank, when he introduced Peggy to him. He had disappeared for two days after that, actively avoiding the two of them. Steve wonders now if Bucky was jealous.

It would make sense; Bucky loved Steve, but while he trusted Steve to protect him physically, he never really seemed to get around to trusting him emotionally. Steve wants to fucking laugh, because—looking at everything the way it is now—it really should have been the other way around. Sure, Steve had his reservations towards the beginning of their relationship, but, in the end, Steve did everything in his power to make sure he didn’t hurt Bucky emotionally.

He can’t really say the same for Bucky’s physical well-being, considering. He tried to teach Bucky how to defend himself, yeah, but he had already been a natural fighter from his days as a vagabond. Steve just cleaned up his punches, taught him how to kick, how to shift and control his body. He had moved so well; he fought like he was dancing.

Steve is pulled back into reality by Peggy placing a hand on his shoulder. He looks up at her, sees the concern etched into her eyebrows.

“Steve,” she says. “What’s wrong?”

And he just wants to break down; he just wants to fucking cry, because everyone always asks him what’s wrong but those people hadn’t been _Peggy_. He could never lie to Peggy; not while they were dating and not after.

“I fucked up,” he murmurs. “I couldn’t save him and now—now he’s—”

“Steve,” she says, sitting next to him. “It’s not your fault.”

“It is,” he says. “I couldn’t protect him, Pegs. I couldn’t even save him after the fact.”

“Steve,” she sighs. She presses her lips into a line and then says, “There’s someone here to see you. I found her when I was deep undercover, and I rescued her when she told me you guys had been captured. She wants to see you, says you knew her before this… whole thing started.”

Steve’s eyebrows knit together. “Who?”

“Wanda Maximoff.”

Wanda…? It takes a second, but eventually Steve remembers—she was the one who owned the gem shop a few doors down from Steve’s old brownstone. She lived above the shop with her brother; Steve remembers Bucky saying something about her store closing down, and Steve had been disappointed, but didn’t really think much of it. Not until now, at least.

“She wasn’t treated really well, so Bruce is looking after her until she gets her strength back up, but… you should talk to her, when you can. She’s got some interesting stuff to say.” Peggy pats his shoulder and stands, making her exit. Steve is both disappointed and glad that she’s gone; while Steve likes Peggy, her presence is overwhelming sometimes. Steve just wants to be alone right now, even if that means stewing in his own anger and disappointment.

Later that night, when everything has settled down and Steve has gotten a few hours of sleep, everyone comes together to figure out the game plan.

Steve wants info from the Hydra agent, so Tony runs the agent’s picture through facial recognition, and finds that he’s named Helmut Zemo; twenty-nine years old, Russian. His file says he’s been missing for more than four years, and has been declared legally dead.

Tony’s put him in a glass cell, like a little bubble. He assures Steve that there’s no way that Zemo could get out even if he changed into his familiar form, which he has not done yet, but there’s always the chance.

Peggy tells everyone about the experiments that Hydra has been running.

“I was deep undercover as a Hydra agent for several months, so I didn’t have much clearance. I had no idea the attack on SHIELD was coming until it happened,” she explains. “I found Wanda when I was working on one of the bigger projects. They’re taking witches and familiars and experimenting on them, for some reason. Lots of reasons, really.”

“Like what?” Natasha asks,

“Like, trying to figure out if there’s a certain gene that can trigger whether a person ends up being a witch or familiar. Or if they can make it so humans have familiar forms by opening their souls up.”

“Opening up their _souls_?” Tony repeats in horror, one hand going to his chest and clutching it, trying to fend off the phantom pain. “What the fuck?”

Sam shakes his head and says, “Anything else?”

Peggy sighs, “Okay, the thing is that each enhanced human is no better than a naturally-born magical being. No matter how hard they tried, they couldn’t get their humans to match the power of natural witches and familiars. Their familiars only have the power to change into rats, mice, or cockroaches, and their ‘enhanced’ human-witches are no better than any regular human who taught themself magic. They just weren’t getting the results that they wanted. So they decided to find natural witches and familiars who could fill in the gaps, and see what they could do from there.”

Peggy bites her lip and says, “They have a master plan — Project Insight — to spread Hydra’s reach around the world. I didn’t have clearance for the project, but I found some of the files for the plan, and—and then I found Wanda when I was making my way out, and I couldn’t leave her.”

“Project Insight? Isn’t that the name for the Bill in Congress?” Sam asks.

Peggy nods gravely.

“Well, what is it?” Steve says, almost impatiently.

Gathering herself, Peggy explains, “They’ve genetically enhanced Seers so that they can see into the future of the entire world’s population. Any time they detect a threat against Hydra, a kill squad will be sent to take out the target before they can ever even commit the act. And Pierce is trying to pass Project Insight as a Bill in Congress, parading it as terrorism-control, so that whatever murders he commits are completely legal and justified.”

“And more and more naysayers are weeded out while the true believers are the ones who can take control,” Sam deduces for everyone.

Peggy nods, and a grim feeling settles over the room.

“So,” Steve says, gears turning in his head, “Bucky was targeted from the beginning? It wasn’t just to… get some sort of information about me?”

Peggy shrugs. “I don’t know for sure,” she admits. “But Bucky has a very powerful bloodline. I’m not sure if they even knew that you were living there before they raided the place.”

Steve’s whole world has flipped sideways, and he wants to sit down. In some sick way, it makes him feel better that they weren’t targeting Bucky to get to Steve. At least Bucky wasn’t caught in the crossfire. At least he didn’t take the bullet that was meant for Steve; Bucky had a bullet with his own name on it the whole time.

“We need to interrogate our guest,” Tony decides. “See if he knows the intricacies of Project Insight. When they’re planning to do it, what’s going to happen…”

“Yeah,” Steve says distantly. “I agree.”

“I doubt he’ll break,” Natasha says. “But it’s worth a shot.”

+++

They send Sam in first to interrogate him, but four minutes in, they send Steve in instead, Tony following him close behind. Natasha stands outside, sending Steve looks that tell him that she’s not sure how well this is going to work.

Zemo is relatively talkative, considering that he’s only spoken twice in about four months to say cryptic things to Steve. He’s gotten no less irritating, however, and he’s hell-bent on not giving anything up, even though Steve knows that Hydra is probably very angry at him for letting Steve, Nat, and Sam escape custody.

“What do you know about Project Insight?” Steve asks him.

Zemo looks up from his spot — a little inflated air mattress that Tony was so kind to set up for him.

“Do you really think I’ll tell you?” Zemo asks, almost bored.

“I’m a very optimistic person,” Steve says.

“Optimistic? Or just stupid?” Zemo chuckles. He leans back in his chair and says, “I think you already know everything you need to know about the plan. What more can I really tell you?”

“When is Project Insight going through?” Steve asks.

Zemo sighs. “You just don’t understand. There is no _start_ to Project Insight. It’s already happening. It doesn’t matter what you do, now. Hydra has the upper hand, _always_.”

Steve wants to fucking slap the guy, because _seriously_. Eventually Steve looks over to Tony, who just gives him a shrug. Steve looks back to Zemo.

“Anything else, Captain?” he asks.

Steve twists his lip down in distaste. Here he is; here he is. He might as well ask. “What did they do to him?” he asks.

“Who?” Zemo asks. As if he doesn’t know.

“You know who,” Steve says, just short of snapping at him. “James Buchanan Barnes. The man you were sent to kidnap months ago.”

The man just folds his lips between his teeth and shakes his head. “That’s classified information,” he says, a teasing grin unfolding on his face.

Steve marches forward, and pokes the man hard in the chest. “You know what they had planned, I can see it in your beady fucking eyes,” he says through gritted teeth. “You _know_ what they were planning, you _know_ what they wanted with him, and it _wasn’t_ to bait me, or get to me. They wanted _him specifically._ Now what did they _do_ to him?”

Zemo bats Steve’s hand off of him, brushing his shirtfront off, as if Steve has dirtied it. He looks at Steve with a slow, deliberate gaze, shaking his head. He looks about ready to roll his eyes, but instead he just repositions himself on the old, lumpy air mattress so that he’s sitting cross-legged.

“Tell me, Captain,” Zemo says, leaning forward with a cruel smile on his face. “Do you want to save James Barnes because you love him, or because you’re guilty for letting us take him in the first place?”

Steve’s face falls blank. He steps forward, obviously surprising the Hydra agent, reaches out, snatches the front of the man’s shirt, and fists his hand in the fabric.

He breathes shakily through his nostrils. “What. Did. You. _Do_. To him?” he growls. Each word is punctuated with white-hot anger. The sentence leaves his lips slowly, burning his tongue with the intensity of his rage. He’s shaking, about ten seconds away from throwing this man against the wall and calling it a fucking day.

But Zemo just laughs. “What is it, Captain?” he sneers. “Am I correct?”

Steve shoves the man away. The agent lands hard on the air mattress.

He looks at Zemo for a long time,  who looks up at him with a cokiness that just serves to piss Steve the fuck off. He makes a decision and nods to himself.

Sick with the intensity of his anger, Steve turns away, saying, “Let him go. Put him outside, wherever. He’s not going to give us any information, then I don’t care. If the police get him, they get him. If Hydra gets him, they get him. He’s not my fucking problem anymore.”

Zemo’s smile slips from his face. “No,” he says, serious now that Steve is dismissing him. “They’re angry that I let you get away from them. They’ll kill me.”

“That’s the idea,” Steve says.

“Uh, Cap—” Tony starts.

“Either you do it or I do it,” he interrupts. Tony says nothing, looking taken aback by Steve’s snappish tone. Steve says, “That’s what I thought,” and leaves the room, hearing Tony take out a pair of handcuffs as the door swing shut slowly behind him. The last thing he hears is Zemo shouting, “I’ll tell you whatever you need to know!” as Steve makes his way around the corner.

He grits his teeth and decides to go upstairs. In the elevator up, he trembles with unreleased anger, unsure of what to do with it. He wants to punch something. Namely, he wants to punch Zemo, who had the fucking gall to laugh in his face when it came to talking about Bucky.

“Sir,” JARVIS says in a gentle tone.

“What,” Steve answers gruffly.

“Mr. Wilson is requesting your presence on the fiftieth floor.”

Steve grits his teeth. He doesn’t want to see anyone right now, but he really doesn’t have much of a choice. If Sam is asking for him, he needs him.

“Tell him I’m on my way,” he says, and punches in the floor number he needs.

 

+++

“Well, what happened?” Steve says.

Sam rubs the back of his neck and then drops his hand. “Peggy was working in a Hydra facility, in Russia,” Sam says. “She was trying to gather info about their plan and their next move, long before the two of us ever even put it together.”

They’re walking down a long hallway — a medical floor in the Stark Tower. “She picked up Wanda when the attack on SHIELD was happening. Everything was scrambled, and Peggy just — picked her up, I guess.”

They stop in front of a door, a little window showing the inside. A few chairs, a bed, and a patient that Steve recognizes.

Wanda Maximoff. Steve barely believes his eyes when he sees her—she’s changed so much since he last saw her. Her hair falls around her shoulders in limp strands, her clothing hangs around her frame loosely, and her skin clings to bone in a weak manner. The girl needs food. She looks ghastly. Bruce is tending to her, taking her blood pressure, it seems. Steve steps away from the window, giving them their privacy.

He knew her shop was closed, but he had no idea that _this_ was happening. He barely knows her but for the fact that she lived right down the street from him, with her brother, but he had no idea that she ever thought of him, he had no idea that something was so wrong…

“Cap,” a voice is saying. “You alright?”

Steve turns to where the sound is coming from, notices that Tony is there, and Sam is looking concerned right next to him.

“I’m… I’m okay,” he says, but he feels oddly detached, like he’s watching his life happen from somewhere far back in his head.

“Do you know what happened to her?” Steve asks.

Sam presses his lips together in a straight, hard line. “Man… you should let her tell you that.”

Steve doesn’t want to wait for her to do that. He needs to know what happened so he can help her now. She doesn’t exactly look like the picture of perfect health.

“Was it… something to do with Insight?” he asks.

Sam takes a deep breath and nods. “Yes,” he admits, “but I’m not going to be the one to tell you, okay? She was asking for you when she first got here. She’s going to tell you what happened, Steve. She wants your help more than she wants any of ours.”

That’s a mistake, Steve thinks, because he hasn’t really been so good at helping people lately. But he nods and says, “I think I’m going to wait here.”

Sam concedes and says that he’s going to go upstairs. Tony lets him pass, and the two are left alone. Steve stands there, back against the wall, and they sit in companionable silence for a few moments.

“How’re you holding up, big guy?” Tony asks, bumping their shoulders together.

Steve wonders what people have told him, how Steve saw Bucky, how Bucky didn’t remember him… It’s hard to believe it’s been less than three days. It feels like it’s been a month.

“I don’t know,” Steve answers honestly, after a moment’s deliberation. “I feel like… I don’t know.”

Tony nods and looks back down at his feet.

“It’s like…” Steve continues, though he knows Tony didn’t push, “it’s like, now that I know he’s alive, I have to get him _now_. Because if I wait too long, they’re going to kill him. Or hurt him.” Well, hurt him more than they already have. Bucky’s memory is erased. He didn’t know Steve. He didn’t even know his own _name_.

Tony looks up at him again, nodding as Steve talks. When he finishes, he says, “If you ever need someone to talk to, Cap, I’ll be here to listen,” he says. He quirks up his lip in a humorless smile. “I know I’m probably not your first choice for emotional support, but… I can listen.”

Steve smiles a little and claps a hand on Tony’s shoulder. “Thank you, Tony,” he says, and nods just slightly. “That’s a two-way street, by the way. The same goes for me. I’ll listen to you, whenever you need to vent.”

Steve nods and ducks his head, staring at his shoes. Zemo’s words echo in his head, and he feels a constriction there that didn’t exist before. He knows that what he did to him was wrong, but he can’t bring himself to feel bad about it.

“What if he’s right?” Steve whispers.

Tony looks at him again, not understanding.

“What if Zemo’s right?” he clarifies. “What if I’m just doing this because I can’t stand the thought of being responsible for this?”

“Steve,” he says. Steve looks towards him. “Don’t fall into that trap. You know he’s just trying to get into your head.”

But Tony doesn’t understand. He knows that Zemo was just trying to get into his head, but… “But what if what he said was _true_ , Tony? What if—what if, all this time, I’ve just been doing this because I’m guilty? What if I’m just being selfish?”

“First of all,” Tony says, his tone sharp, “any person with half a brain cell can tell how much you love Bucky. Steve, when you lost him… I saw what he meant to you. You haven’t been yourself since. Natasha told me that you could barely lay a hand on him back there.”

That much is true. Most of his fighting with Bucky involved a lot of dodging and blocking. He couldn’t bring himself to try and fight back. Every hit that he landed on Bucky hurt his soul. It was like he could feel the punches land on his own skin.

“Secondly,” he says, quieter this time, but no less intense, “tell me the first thing that comes to your mind. Very first thing. Why do you want Bucky back?”

“So he can be safe.”

“Okay,” he says. “You’re not being selfish. I know you, pal. If you were being selfish, you would say, ‘So we can Bond again,’ or, ‘So we can get back together,’ or whatever. You have his best interests in mind.”

“But I _do_ want those things,” Steve says. “I want things to go back to how they were. I want to get back together with Bucky, eventually.”

“That’s what I’m saying, Steve. _Eventually._ It’s okay to be hopeful that those things will happen down the line. I know that you don’t _expect_ them to happen the second he comes back, I know that you don’t even _want_ them to happen the second he comes back. You know that. And that’s why I know that you’re not being selfish about this, Steve. Bucky’s interests are coming before your own, and that’s the definition of selflessness. You’re okay, Steve. Alright?”

He nods, pinches the bridge of his nose. “Okay. Okay. Thank you.”

The door opens behind him, and Tony and Steve both turn around at the same time to see who it is. It’s Bruce, standing in the doorway.

“Wanda says she’s ready to talk whenever you are, Steve.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> anyway, it's been four weeks since i started college and i'm already thinking of changing my major!!!! new major? vote on your phones now


	17. Major Arcana / The Hanged Man.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> hey kiddos!! this chapter has tarot cards in it! i know some religions don't like tarot cards and if that part of the chapter makes you uncomfortable, then skip over it. the section starts at "have you ever had your cards read, captain?" i would recommend at least skimming it, because it has some pertinent information to the story and what's gonna go down and such. 
> 
> as always, if there are any glaring errors or whatever, pls leave a comment and tell me where it is! it's 1:01AM and im too tired to proofread rn

They’re sitting in one of the common rooms of Stark Tower. Wanda seemed uncomfortable in such a clinical, medical setting, so Steve suggested that they move somewhere more human.

Steve makes them a pot of tea while Wanda settles in in the couch, pulling a throw blanket over her knees. Steve returns in a few minutes, holding the mugs of tea in his hands.

He can’t help but notice how cold she looks, even with the blanket and her long-sleeves. Her face has a little more color to it than when he first saw her, so that is good, but he’s a little wary about talking to her about something so heavy when she seems so sickly.

But she was the one who requested to talk to him, he remembers, and decides to just continue on with it.

“Tell me what happened,” he requests, voice as soft as he can make it without it becoming a whisper. He offers her the mug. She takes her tea straight, no sugar or milk, which Steve finds a little endearing. “From the beginning.”

She accepts the tea from Steve’s grip and wraps her fingers around it, warming her palms. She takes a deep breath and seems to contemplate how best to tell her story. She takes a few sips from the tea before setting it down on a side table next to the couch.

“It seems like such a long time ago,” she says finally, bringing her knees to her chest. “Bucky came in to buy stones from my shop. He didn’t know then, but… he was being watched. By Hydra. A few weeks after that, three men came into my shop while I was closing.I told them that we were closing and asked them to come back tomorrow. And they just — they attacked me. My brother came to help but they knocked him out, and then me.” She tears up a little, but remains quiet. “They took us both. Separated the two of us. Then… and then…” She scrunches her face up tight, like she’s trying very hard to remember something. “I didn’t know where they took us. But I—”

She cuts herself off, trying to gather her thoughts. Steve nods in encouragement, keeping quiet and holding in all the questions he wants to ask. Berating her will not help. When she’s ready, she continues without Steve prompting her.

“They asked me what I knew about… Bucky. They asked me where he lived, if I knew any personal information.” She covers her mouth with her hand, her face crumpling in sadness. “I’m sorry. It’s all my fault. I must have been the one to tip them off. I didn’t—”

Steve shakes his head. “Don’t apologize.” He looks away as he waits for her to gather herself again. “That was on me. I never renewed the cloaking spell on the brownstone. They wouldn’t have been able to find us if…” He trails off, and she presses her lips into a thin line, ducking her head.

She swallows the lump in her throat and continues. “They put me on an airplane and took me across the ocean. Somewhere in Russia, I think. Maybe Siberia. I can’t be certain. They experimented on me, gave me abilities…” She clenches her hands tight. “Very strong abilities. They took my talent to see into a person’s future and expanded it. I could see their thoughts, their fears. I could make them see things that aren’t real. I could see their pasts, I could see farther into their futures… and then I could see everyone’s futures. But I was too afraid to use it against them. They knew I would be.”

She swallows hard, trying to gather the courage for what she’s about to say. Steve’s stomach fills with apprehension. “They kept me there to predict the future of their recruits. Bucky was one of them, with my brother.”

Her eyes fill with tears; she stops speaking for a moment, lost in thought.

“What happened?” Steve asks gently. He goes to add on that she doesn’t have to tell him, that it’s fine, but she starts talking before he gets the chance.

“Bucky and my brother were both part of a group set up by Hydra called the Wolf Spider Program. They… took familiars away from their homes, took their memories and trained them to be killers.” She wraps her arms tightly around herself. “The members were all hand-picked by Hydra agents… but they thinned out the group by putting them on a survival mission in the middle of the Russian tundra.”

Steve’s heart sinks right out of his chest. “Oh,” he says, before he can control himself.

Wanda’s tearful eyes flick up to him. “Bucky and my brother became good friends. He helped my brother survive several weeks on the tundra… but it was not enough.” Her voice breaks but she takes a shaky breath and continues anyway. “My brother didn’t survive. Only four of them did, out of twelve.”

Steve’s breath leaves him in a rush. “Wanda…”

She waves him off. “He managed to be kind even without his memories. But they’ve taken so much from him. There’s barely anything left besides his instincts. His loyalty.”

A shiver runs down Steve’s spine and he looks down, wrapping his hands a little tighter around the mug, looking to absorb its warmth. He takes an anxious sip as Wanda continues.

“You know Insight?”

Steve nods.

“Hydra has its fingerprints all over it, Steve. There’s a man—Pierce.”

Steve’s world suddenly tips sideways. “ _Alexander_ Pierce?” he demands.

Wanda flinches at Steve’s loudness. “Yes,” she whispers. “He’s been behind this since the beginning. Project Insight is not just for destroying threats preemptively in other countries, Steve. It’s for destroying our own people. People who aren’t even terrorists—just people who are threats to Hydra.”

His heart beats faster. Pierce, the man looking to run the country, was going to kill his own citizens.

When he finally finds his voice again, he whispers, “I need to know what to do. Please help me.”

She stares at him with big brown eyes, not knowing what to say. He tries, “What’s going to happen to Bucky? Please.”

She shakes her head and replaces her hand in her lap. “Steve, the future isn’t set in stone. That’s why Insight is such a failure. Yes, I can see the future—but the future is subject to change. No one can accurately tell what will happen, only what may happen. Sometimes, our predictions come true, but not all the time.”

Steve feels his stomach drop. “I thought you—”

“I know,” she says. “But there are a million things can happen. Depending on what choices are made, the future can be any number of possibilities. I can’t tell you exactly what’s going to happen. I can’t even tell you what might happen, because that—knowing—could change everything, too.”

“So you can’t help me,” Steve says miserably.

“I didn’t say that,” she says. “I have an idea, if you’re willing to try.”

“Sure,” Steve agrees, hope filling his chest again.

Wanda smiles at him and says, “Have you ever had your cards read, Captain?”

 

Wanda asks JARVIS if there is any way to get what she is asking for. He tells her that everything she could possibly need is within the Tower, and then informs her that her room will be set up completely in a couple hours. In a few short minutes, an attendant comes up the elevator and delivers to her what she asked for.

Tarot cards.

The process is relatively short. Steve has never had his cards read before, but he knows that humans and plenty of cunning folk use tarot cards fairly frequently, even though having magic doesn’t technically guarantee an accurate reading. Most times, it takes a seasoned Seer to read the cards well.

“Now,” Wanda says, shuffling the cards absent-mindedly, “remember that the cards don’t necessarily tell the future. The future is up to you. They look into the past to help you with your present. They help with decisions. But they do not tell you what will happen. Okay. Ask the cards a question.”

Steve swallows. “Um—what should I do now? To help—Bucky? Myself. Everyone.”

She smirks a little and shuffles the cards carefully and has Steve split the deck. Wanda positions the cards in a line, puts the deck back together, then starts taking the cards off the top of the deck, arranging them in a V-shape.

Steve looks at the cards as they are placed in front of him: the Ace of Cups, the Six of Swords, the Ten of Wands, the Hanged Man, the Five of Pentacles, the Three of Swords, and the Hermit.

Wanda studies the cards for a quick moment before she shakes her head. “Most people use tarot cards to ask about their love lives, but they’re for more than that. They give you insight to yourself that you hadn’t even realized. They’re a mirror into the darkest parts of yourself, perhaps the ones you don’t want to look at.”

Steve looks at the cards, feeling a little churning in his stomach. He can’t stop looking at the middle card in the line — the Hanged Man.

“Every position of the card means something. Card one,” she says, bringing her hand to the Ace of Cups, “represents the past. And the suit of Cups usually represents emotions. Aces denote new beginnings.” She smiles softly. “It’s, um, probably talking about the relationship you had with Bucky.”

Steve’s mouth quirks up, but he doesn’t smile all the way. “Yeah, thanks, cards,” he says dryly.

She chuckles and looks at the card a little more closely. “Each card means many things. It’s open to interpretation. But there are times, when they are arranged a certain way, that it leads you to come to one conclusion.” She glances up from the cards to meet his eyes. “You opened yourself up to something you never had before. You began something new, with someone you cared very much about.” She tilts her head to the side and asks, “Did you Bond with him?”

Steve swallows the lump in his throat and says, whisper-soft, “Yes.”

Her face falls and she looks down at the table in front of her. She reaches forward, careful to not mess up the cards and their positioning, and takes Steve’s hands in her own. “I’m sorry,” she says.

“You don’t have to say sorry,” Steve says. “Not like it was your fault.”

“It was, in a way,” she says, pressing her lips together.

“Wanda…” But she just shakes her head before he can go on.

“I know what you’re going to say,” she says. “Believe me, though, Steve. It’s not going to change anything. The only way that it’ll change is if I do something now. Which, I’m trying.”

Not knowing what else to say, Steve nods. She clears her throat, takes her hand away. “The next card represents the present.” Steve looks at the card, the Six of Swords, depicting three people in a boat, pushing off towards the open water.

“The Six of Swords,” Wanda says, “means travelling. Beginning a journey, moving on from one part of your life and going towards the next. Perhaps, leaving something behind.”

Steve doesn’t like looking at the card. Three figures. None of their faces are pictured. It’s less of a card and more of a story.

“Okay,” Steve says. “I can see that.” He chuckles nervously.

She considers him for a moment before deciding to move on to the next card. “The third card represents the future. It tells the possibility of what could happen if you were to continue on your path.”

Steve looks at the card, the Ten of Wands, showing a man struggling to keep all the wands bundled into his arms.

“The Ten of Wands usually represents struggle,” she says. She seems to be trying to phrase her words as delicately as possible. “Struggle from taking on too much, spreading yourself too thin. You want to do things yourself, and you can’t or won’t ask for help.”

Steve’s hands clench at that, and he wants to yell. But instead he just exhales slowly.  “Who did you talk to?” he asks, trying to keep his voice even and quiet.

Wanda looks up from the cards and stares at Steve with big, brown eyes. “What do you mean?” she asks.

“Who did you talk to? Sam? Natasha? Bruce? Who did you talk to?”

“Captain,” she says. “I’m just reading the cards. If you do not want to hear it, what they have to say, then we can stop. But I believe it’s best you hear what they have to say.”

Steve feels a little apprehension towards this now, but instead of saying anything, he just sits back and looks sheepish.

Wanda looks at him, as if gauging whether or not he’s going to accuse her of things again. “The fourth card is representative of you,” she says.

“The Hanged Man,” Steve reads. He stares long and hard at the card. It depicts a man hanging upside down, suspended by one foot, a halo of light surrounding his head. Steve’s stomach turns. Wanda must take his tone for judgement, because she rushes to explain.

“Yes, he is hanged,” she allows, “but he also has a halo around his head. He is — he’s reached some kind of enlightenment. He is a saint. A martyr.” She looks to be wincing with every word that she says.

“The Hanged Man can be interpreted different ways, like any card,” she goes on. “The rope around his ankle can be seen as restricting, or — in a way — freeing. He is not in control anymore, yes, but perhaps that is what is needed. To let go. Or, perhaps, he is sacrificing himself. Trying to help others the only way he can anymore.”

There’s a tense moment where Steve’s emotions roll around in his stomach, unsure what the feel first. He sits there for a moment, unsure how to respond. This is _him_? He wants to deny it, but he’s heard enough from Natasha and Sam about these exact same behaviors that the card is describing now. Even the universe won’t give him a break.

“Steve,” Wanda says when she sees the look on Steve’s face, “I’m not trying to hurt you. I don’t know what you are feeling, I’m just trying to help. If you want to stop, we can.”

“No,” he says, voice thick. “Let’s keep going.”

She looks wary, but says, “Card five is representative of outside influences. People and things that influence you.”

“This one usually represents a lack of material wealth, but it also has a spiritual component to it. It — it represents a lack of something vital. Money, food, friends. Which is strange, because you have all those things. Unless you think you don’t,” she adds, as an afterthought. “Oh.”

Steve remains quiet, slides his hands off the table to hold them in his lap.

“Steve,” she says. “Your friends love you. They do. They’ll support you through anything. You don’t have to do these things alone.”

“I know,” he says, mostly to save face. He feels like someone’s split open his chest and is showing his insides to the world, vulnerable, nowhere to hide. “I know they do. It’s — I just…”

Wanda doesn’t seem to expect him to continue after he trails off, so she just moves on to the next card.

“The sixth card represents your hopes and fears,” she whispers. “Steve—”

“Keep going,” he says, before she can get a chance to say anything. “I need to hear it.”

“The Three of Swords — well, just looking at it, I’m sure you can see what it stands for. Heartbreak, betrayal, loneliness. These are things that you’re afraid will happen. You’re afraid of being rejected, but—” She bites her bottom lip, stopping herself from continuing.

“Just say it,” Steve says tiredly.

After a moment’s consideration, she does. “You’re afraid of rejection, but you keep isolating yourself. You see—” She pushes the Hermit forward. “The last card represents the outcome of your situation if you keep continuing on the track that you’re on. The Hermit — well, I mean, he’s called the Hermit for a reason. He’s alone, Captain. Maybe it’s from choice or from necessity, but he’s alone, nonetheless. If you keep pushing people away then soon, there won’t be people to push away anymore.”

Steve doesn’t say anything, just sits there and takes the onslaught of her words.

“There are no bad cards,” she says. “They give symbols to represent different things. The Death card doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll die, just like the Lovers card doesn’t necessarily mean you’ll meet your soulmate. But they all mean something. Steve. Captain. Please don’t think I’m trying to anger you. But I can see it in you. I saw it when I saw Bucky’s past the first time in my shop. I shook his hand and I—I saw every fight, all the anger, the rift between the two of you, even though you both obviously felt the same way. Am I making sense?”

Steve stares long and hard at the cards. “I don’t… I don’t know.”

She tilts her head at him, reaches across the table, asking for his hands. He reluctantly rests his hands in her upturned palms.  She traces the lines in his palm, shaking her head.

“You’ve always been a martyr, Steve.” She looks up at him, folds his fingers into a fist. “You are so kind, and gentle, and loving… until someone hurts someone you love, and then you change completely. I can see…” She closes her eyes for a moment. “I can see how much you love him, how much you ache to be with him. Usually, you have a plan. A mission. But right now, you don’t know what to do, because you are afraid that you’ll do it wrong. And that scares you. And being afraid makes you act in fear.”

She opens her eyes and stares at him. “You are kind, loving, gentle, but when it comes to Bucky, you are angry. Merciless. _Vengeful_. You need to set aside those emotions and clear your head. You need to stop pretending like you are the only one who can save him. Because you need help to do it. You need your team. They will tell you what you need to do. Understand?”

Steve nods slowly. “Okay. Okay,” he whispers. “I understand. Thank you.”

“Good,” she says. “Now, I need to rest. And you do, too, Captain.”

Steve takes her advice and heads for the elevator alone, trying to blink away the prickling in the corners of his eyes.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> fun fact, the reading for steve in this chapter was done by me. i have my own tarot deck and decided that i was going to read for steve, and these were the cards that got spit out. it's scarily accurate? tarot reading is very interesting to me but i'm just getting started in it, so if there are things wrong with it, then you can leave your distaste in the comments or something idc


	18. Theoretical Magic

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> It's the beginning of the end, children! One more chapter after this, and then an epilogue! wooooooooooo! I'll put my sentiments in the notes at the end

Steve doesn’t like asking for help; it’s a habit that came to fruition when he was younger. Before he had the Serum, everyone was always trying to help him with things that he didn’t need help with, because they thought he was helpless. Now, even when he needs help, it’s like he’s proving a point to himself, or the world, or God, or whatever the fuck — because he can do it, and he doesn’t want your goddamn pity, thank you very much.

The next morning, Steve gets up and makes a decision. He goes to the elevator and punches in a number — he thinks that this is the place where his friends will be, but he’s not entirely sure until he steps out of the elevator and hears voices coming from around the corner, in the kitchen. Steve marches over there before he can convince himself to turn back.

His friends are all gathered together in the kitchen — even Tony seems to be there, taking a break from his work long enough to eat and socialize. Clint seems to have joined them as well, and Steve wonders what he got up to yesterday when everything was happening. To be honest, Steve wouldn’t be surprised if he had been sleeping.

“I need your help,” Steve announces.

His mother must be rolling in her grave right now. If she had ever heard him utter those words, she would probably ask him what he’d done with her son.

 _What the fucking fuck_ , he thinks to himself.

They look up, surprised by his presence. It’s quiet for a split second before Clint takes a loud slurp of coffee.

“Help with…?” Sam trails off.

“Defeating Hydra,” Steve says, but it sounds like a question.

Nat, however, doesn’t see his lack of confidence that way, and gets right to business—not mentioning anything, not saying _I told you so_ , which Steve is grateful for.

“We need to find where this is all going down, first. Or,” she says, holding up a hand, “we find Pierce and attack him directly. Cut off the head of the snake.”

“But Insight still might go through in Congress,” Sam says. “We need to crumble it from within.”

“But how would we even do that? _Without_ killing a national senator?” Peggy asks.

Clint sets his coffee to the side and says, “We need to find where their Diviners are and — I don’t know. Save them? Or….” He trails off, looking uncomfortable.

“We can’t kill them,” Peggy says. “They haven’t done anything wrong.”

“But if we don’t, someone else might try to get their hands on them. Go through with Hydra’s unfinished business,” Tony points out.

“Look,” Steve says, “the only way this is going to happen is if we do like Sam says. We have to crumble it from within — and that is by getting their Seers. We don’t have to kill them, we just have to get them away from Hydra. We have to make sure that they’re safe, and can figure what we have to do with them after that. I’m sure they’ll be able to think for themselves.”

Steve takes a deep breath, runs a hand through his hair. “As for Pierce — we have all the evidence we need to get him arrested. We have Wanda’s eyewitness account, Peggy’s files, the reports from SHIELD… we just need to get them public. I can — I can release them.”

There’s a very quiet moment as what Steve says starts to sink in. Steve knows what might happen if they decide to go through with this, but Peggy starts to say it anyway.

“Steve,” she says, “you know — you know if you release this information, you could be in real trouble. Those are classified records.”

“We’ll be in more trouble if we sit back and try to figure out another way to do it,” Steve says.

Natasha takes a deep breath and says, “Yeah, we can release the records. But, meanwhile, Insight might still go through at any time. You heard Zemo — he said there was no start or end date.”

“The only way we’re gonna beat Hydra is if we do it with magic,” Clint says. “I’m guessing the Seers will be heavily guarded. Oh, and we should probably figure out where they’re actually keeping the Seers.”

Steve sighs. “I can’t spend all my time trying to get Bucky doing sigil after sigil. I’ll be caught in a heartbeat.”

Natasha sits back and twists her finger through her hair thoughtfully. “You need some way that you can cast spells quickly.”

“So, a wand?” Tony says.

“Except that wands don’t exist,” Steve says. “They’re just theoretical.”

Which is true—there are accounts of wands existing, small vessels that transfer magic easily, without the need for sigil magic or murmured incantations. Just the intent, and then the spell. It’s a nice thought, but Steve is sure that there are reasons why wands haven’t been invented — giving a free range of magic to the average witch and telling them to just use their intent is probably a scary idea to regular humans, who already have a difficult time dealing with Soul Bonds between witches and familiars.

“Not if I invent one,” Tony sasses.

“People have tried,” Natasha sasses back. “It’s like time travel, Tony. It’s not going to happen.”

“Just ‘cause you said that, I’m going to invent it,” Tony says, dead fucking serious. “Prepare to eat some words, Romanoff.”

“A wand, or time travel?” Nat calls after him. Tony doesn’t answer, which troubles Steve. The wand he’s fine with, but the idea of Tony trying to invent some sort of time-travelling device sounds like a disaster waiting to happen.

“I’m not sure how I feel about a human inventing a wand,” Clint interjects.

“It’s Tony,” Steve says dismissively. “I’m not entirely sure he’s human anyway.”

Sam laughs, and Steve cracks a smile — his first real one in days.

 

It takes four sleepless days for Tony to pull it off, but he fucking _does_ it.

Steve and Sam have been working nearly non-stop, trying to figure out a plan that will help them extract the Seers safely from wherever they’re being kept. Peggy knows that Wanda was being kept at the base that she was working at while she was deep undercover, but she has reason to believe that they might be keeping the Seers separate in case a situation like this arises, where someone is trying to thwart their master plan.

They’re making progress, but Steve is raring to get the plan underway even though he knows that none of them are ready.

“Sir,” JARVIS says, waking Steve from an already-troubled sleep.

“Wassat?” Steve grumbles, pushing himself up in bed, still half-asleep.

“Mister Stark is requesting your presence in his laboratory.”

Steve looks at the alarm clock next to his bed. “It’s four in the fuckin’ morning,” Steve groans.

“I’m afraid he’s rather insistent,” JARVIS chirps. “Putting him off now won’t deter him.”

Sadly, JARVIS is right—Steve just wishes he weren’t. Steve knows how Tony gets when he becomes so hyperfocused like this. Tony will dump Steve out of bed himself if he has to.

Steve grumbles, but he manages to make his way out of bed, stumbling a little when he tries to walk. Noticing that he’s in only his boxers, he sleepily shucks on a pair of sweatpants and an old shirt.

Steve makes his way to the elevator and asks JARVIS to take him down to the lab. JARVIS does so, and asks Steve if he would like a cup of coffee, which Steve declines.

The elevator doors open and Steve steps out, looking around; he hasn’t been in Tony’s lab for a while, and it looks different now. It’s a much bigger space, for one, and much cleaner now — no more dirty cement floors, no more dirty-yellow lighting. Everything seems slick and modern, and it throws Steve for a loop.

Tony perks up from a worktable when he hears the elevator doors close.

“Steve!” Tony says excitedly. He gets up and bounds over to Steve, and immediately he can see that Tony has had way too much caffeine and not enough rest. The guy’s eyes are so bloodshot, the whites are a pale shade of pink.

“Tony, when was the last time you slept?” Steve asks, frowning. He knows how his friend gets when he sets his mind to something, but judging by the amount of empty coffee mugs and crumpled energy-drink cans, Tony has been at this for a while. “Or took a shower?” he tacks on.

Tony waves his hand dismissively. “I took a shower this morning, don’t you worry your pretty little head.”

“This morning” is a vague term, considering it’s 4AM, but Steve doesn’t push. Tony also doesn’t mention when he last slept, so Steve just assumes that the answer is somewhat troubling. Either way, Steve follows as Tony leads him further into the lab. There are several worktables, cluttered with mangled-looking pieces of metal, stacks of wood, and opened books. Holograms with different diagrams and web pages about wands and wand hypotheses are projected into the air.

“I _think_ ,” Tony says, “I figured it out. But I need someone with actual magical abilities to test it.”

There are several pieces of sanded wood lying on a table for Steve to choose from, all in different shapes and sizes. He looks them over. There are probably a dozen different pieces, all small enough to be held in one hand.

“They don’t look like I imagined they would,” Steve says.

“Yeah,” Tony says. “I was looking things up, and every case study I came across said that thin, straight wands would burn up whenever someone tried to use them. So I tried metal, but Clint tried using one of those yesterday and it backfired on him.”

Ah. So that’s what the scrap pieces of metal are for. Steve runs his fingers over the potential wands laid out for him. When Steve looks closer, he notices that they’re covered in tiny little sigils and wards, all carved perfectly.

“Did you carve these yourself?” Steve asks.

“No, I lasered them in,” Tony says. “I figured hand-carving it would take too much time or fuck it up, so.”

Steve nods. The intent might be off, but pre-made sigils aren’t unheard of, for those just beginning magic, or the impatient.

He runs his hand over every wand, but he keeps coming back to one. It’s sturdy, but not too large. It has a discernible handle, unlike most of the other prospective wands, being shaped like a wishbone. Sigils and wards cover the entirety of the wand excluding the handle, and it is smooth and finished, if a little gnarled-looking.

“I like this one,” Steve says.

“Applewood,” Tony remarks. “Makes sense.”

Steve isn’t sure what that’s supposed to mean, but he just runs his fingers over the sigils carved into the wand.

Steve feels a little silly. How is he supposed to go about using a wand when he’s done sigil magic all his life? When he’s had to lay his hands on things to physically transfer the magic from his body into something else? Now he just has to point and think? It seems unreal, and — if he’s being honest with himself — a little unfair.

“Try it out,” Tony urges.

“How am I supposed to—”

“Just like a regular spell,” Tony says. “The intent has to be there. Nothing big for right now, but — something.”

As soon as Steve fully wraps his hand around the wand, every sigil lights up.

“Whoa,” Tony whispers.

Steve has to agree. It’s pretty mesmerizing. But he wants to do a proper spell—so he closes his eyes and reaches into his head, searching around for a spell he could do. He decides on a simple one that he learned as a kid — to make light.

Steve opens his eyes, and — sure enough — an orb of soft light appears at the wishbone-end of the wand, right between the two prongs. As Steve becomes more excited, the light grows, making him smile. God, it — it _works_. He laughs delightedly.

Steve is so mesmerized by the light that he forgets to keep fueling the spell. The light putters out unceremoniously. He’s quiet for a few seconds, unsure of what to do now.

“Well,” Tony says, breaking the silence, “I think it works.”  

“Yeah,” Steve says. “I’d say so.”

After a few moments, Tony takes the wand from Steve’s hand and goes over to his worktable. There are notes and diagrams around the table, and he looks at one before turning around to face Steve again. He hands him the wand, and Steve takes it, already feeling like it belongs to him.

“It needs one more thing to fully activate it,” Tony says. “You know, like — reach its full power. Do any spell you need it to. It can do smaller spells, like charms or hexes, glamours. Maybe wards. But it can’t fully enchant things.”

“And what’s that?” Steve asks, distractedly examining the curve of the wood. “The missing thing I need?”

“A piece of your soul.”

Steve nearly drops the wand. “A what now?”

Tony looks unfazed, but Steve is 100% freaking out. “It won’t work if you don’t put a piece of yourself in there,” he explains. “That’s how it channels your magic more strongly. No one else will ever be able to use it, Steve, don’t worry.”

“I don’t want to put a piece of my soul in this thing!” Steve exclaims. “It’s a stick!”

“You gave half of your soul to Bucky,” Tony points out.

“Are you really comparing the love of my life to a piece of wood your probably found on the sidewalk?”

“First of all,” Tony starts, and that’s when Steve knows he fucked up, winding Tony up like this, “I did _not_ find this on the sidewalk. Secondly, unless you want to risk this thing being used against you, I _really_ think you should—”

“ _No_ ,” Steve says. “I’m not ripping my soul apart again.”

Tony looks taken aback by Steve’s words, it takes him a full ten seconds to reply. “Okay. Whatever you want, buddy.”

+++

The plan is coming together well. He’s given Sam the command on the mission, because he’s not sure that he can keep himself together to make decisions that are good for the entire group. If Steve goes rogue, then it’s only his problem.

They’re leaving tomorrow, Sam told him. This’ll all be over tomorrow. They’re going to rescue the Seers, send Hydra into the ground… But Steve isn’t sure it’s enough. He doesn’t want Hydra headless, he wants it destroyed.

He can’t stop thinking about Bucky. Does he know that they’re coming? Do the Seers even want to be saved? Is going against an enemy that knows every version of reality already a lost battle?

Steve walks through the front doors of _The Bulletin_ and asks the receptionist to see Karen Paige, hoping against hope that she’s still there.

After being directed to the correct floor, Steve goes to the elevator and makes his way to her office. He remembers seeing her in the corner office, when he came here the first time, all those weeks ago. It feels like everything has changed since then.

The elevator opens and he practically bursts out of the doors. He tries to calm himself, gathering the papers he’s carrying close to his chest, not wanting to ruin them. He keeps his head down, trying to avoid a good camera angle.

And then he sees her — again, in the corner office. She’s clicking away at her computer, typing furiously. Steve makes sure to approach quietly, and to knock.

She doesn’t jump when she hears the knock, but she looks surprised to see someone else here so late at night.

“It’s you,” she says. “Hi. I thought—” She shakes her head, smiles a little. “I thought you’d disappeared on me.”

“Not yet,” Steve says, giving her a tight smile.

She gets up from her seat after a moment and walks around to sit on the edge of her desk. “Do you want anything? Coffee, or…?”

“No, I’m good,” Steve says. “I, um—” God, why is he so nervous? “I need you to do something for me, actually. I’m about to do something that… I don’t know I can come back from.”

Karen stands there, her arms crossed, hands tucked under her elbows, as if trying to warm herself. Steve’s words seem to make her close herself off a little. “Go on,” she says evenly.

Steve sighs, pulling out the big stack of files that he has tucked against his chest. “You might want to sit down. It’s a long story.”

 

Steve tells her everything — from being a SHIELD agent, to losing Bucky, to finding Bucky, to Insight, to Wanda’s story. _Everything._

“I know it sounds unreal,” he says, once he’s finished the story. “I know how it sounds. But it’s true. It’s—I have files—”

“Steve,” she says. “I believe you.” She drops her gaze, looks at her fingers as she toys with them in her lap. “Bucky Barnes, huh?” She looks up at him, sees his surprised look—Steve is sure he didn’t mention Bucky’s last name—and says, “We used to hang out at a bar together, before — he disappeared. We tried texting him when none of us saw him for weeks, but he wouldn’t answer, and none of us knew where he lived. Foggy said he helped him home once, but he was too drunk to remember the address.” She smiles tightly, which only lasts a split second before it’s gone again.

Steve is quiet, thoughtful, and then says, “Did he ever mention a roommate? That was me.”

There’s a second before it all clicks. “You’re — oh, _you’re_ the Steve he talked about!” she says excitedly. She laughs to herself for a second.

“Did he talk about me a lot?” Steve asks, frightened and intrigued by the thought.

Karen smiles. “When you got a couple drinks in him, he couldn’t shut up about you. You were always on his mind.”

Steve’s mouth twists and he looks down. She probably doesn’t mean it in a bad way, but Steve feels his stomach twist either way. “Yeah, I’ll bet,” he mutters.

Lookinv at him a little more closely, she says, “He really loved you, Steve.”

He takes a deep breath, sighs. “I know,” he mutters, “I know.” He looks up again, finally meeting her eye. “I’m trying to do right by him.”

She nods, turning her head away and tucking a strand of hair behind her ear. “I’ve been doing my own digging,” she says. “Union Allied, Strike, Hydra — everything. It’s so much, but it’s all connected. But I just don’t have any sort of _proof_.”

Steve smiles and pats the files that he set on her desk while they were talking. “Now you do.”

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> thank you guys for sticking with me as i wrote this work; i know i wasn't the most consistent with updates, and i know there was a period not too long ago when i'm sure you guys thought i had given up on this piece altogether. i assure you that there's more to come, and that there will be a happy ending eventually ... :) 
> 
> as always, if you have questions or if you want to point out a proofreading error, go ahead and leave a comment.


	19. Cognitive Dissonance

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> i'm gonna post the epilogue in a few minutes, because it's really short, but i just need to wrap up a few things. enjoy the last chapter, kiddos!

It goes a bit like this:

Steve tells the others that Karen is writing the exposé on Pierce, Hydra, Strike, and every other of its companies. Everyone seems to be one board with the idea, seeing that Steve trusts Karen enough to do such a thing. He’s also instructed her to release the records to the public, which she agrees to.

The next morning, they take a quinjet to the place that Wanda believes the Seers are being kept.

“There were four of us, including me,” Wanda had told them, earlier that week. “One boy, and the rest of us were girls.”

“Do you know their names?” Steve had asked.

“No,” she admitted. “We didn’t really have time to get to know each other.” She thinks for a moment. “The boy was a familiar, not a witch. I remember because — he was one of the only familiars I knew that could See as well.”

Natasha had nodded. “Are they all blind?” she asked.

“I was the only one who was self-taught,” Wanda said. “The rest were born with the ability.”

The team decided that Wanda shouldn’t go with them, as to not risk her getting taken again by Hydra, and also because she deserves some bedrest after being kept hostage by them for so many months.

Sam, Peggy, Nat, and Steve are all diving into the thick of it. Clint and Tony are staying behind, albeit reluctantly — Clint is their getaway driver, and Tony, the tech-savviest of the team, has been instructed to stay behind and guide the team to the correct area in order to get the Seers. As reluctant as Tony is to stay behind and not get directly into the action, Steve is grateful that he’s going to be their eye in the sky.

Now, the team rides silently in the quinjet, Steve trying to keep his mind on the plan and not other things.

He wonders if Bucky is going to be there. Probably, if he’s being honest with himself. Half of him hopes that he’ll be there, and the other half knows that he should probably be focusing on the actual fate of the world, rather than the fate of one person.

It’s easier said than done.

He toys with the wand in his hand, rolling it between his fingers. The sigils shine with a gentle light, bringing a sense of calmness that he hasn’t felt in a long time. He’s going to try his hardest to actually have this mission go his way for once — it seems like every time he tries to go against Hydra, one more thing gets taken from him, but he really thinks that he has a shot this time.

There are several possibilities that they’ve foreseen — the Seers could either be in three separate rooms, in one room all together, or already going through with Project Insight. Tony hacks into the security system from a laptop he brought with him in the quinjet and searches for the Seers.

“I think I found them,” Tony says, clicking away on his laptop. “Guys?”

Tony turns the laptop around and shows footage of three smallish figures walking down a hallway, guarded by four Hydra agents, dressed in all black.

“I think that’s them,” Peggy says. “They look familiar. Do you see where they’re going?”

“Not yet,” Tony says. “I’ll keep an eye on them.”

As they near their destination, Sam gets up and starts walking around the length of the cabin. “We’re in and we’re out,” he says. “Got it? No hanging back to gather info, no nothing. Steve?”

Steve looks at Sam, tearing his eyes away from his wand. “Understood,” he responds. Sam looks at him like he doesn’t believe him for a second, but doesn’t push the issue any further.

They land a safe distance away, trying not to alert anyone of their arrival. Sam gives them all comms to put in their ears.

After a few moments of waiting, Tony gives them the greenlight  and the four of them leave the quinjet quickly and quietly. Steve holds the wand in his hand, and he can feel his palm starting to sweat. He takes a deep breath and follows the rest of the team, wishing he felt as confident as they look.

They’re nearing the building when they see the first guard. Sam puts his hand up, telling them to wait, and allows Natasha to go ahead and incapacitate the guard. She smiles and changes into her familiar form, trotting up the guard like it’s no issue. The guard stops, considers her in her cat-form, and continues walking. Quietly, Natasha stalks behind him, and when she’s a safe distance, changes into her human form, and knocks out the guard by putting him into a seemingly unbreakable chokehold.

She lowers him to the ground, plucks the ID card off his chest, and waves for the team to follow. Sam nods at her appreciatively, and the team finds the nearest entrance. They all slip inside.

Tony guides them through the chambers and hallways of the building. It’s much bigger than Steve originally thought, and surprisingly bright on the inside. The architecture is strangely modern and sleek. It doesn’t do anything for Steve’s nerves.

Tony directs them to an elevator, and when Peggy expresses her concern for the security cameras, Tony tells her not to worry. Steve isn’t sure what he’s done, but he decides to take his word for it and continue on.

“Now,” Tony says, when they’re all in the elevator. “You’re looking for a level called ‘Lower Level Five’ — I saw a guy punch that in. It’s going to ask for a code, and that code is — you ready for it?”

“Yeah,” Sam says.

“Zero - three - one - one - nine - four - one. Got that?”

“Yep — oh, it’s going.” The elevator dips downward with a jerk, then starts its descent. Steve’s stomach is rolling.

“Good. Kay, there’s no cameras in LL Five, so you’re on your own there. But I think you’re all going to be good there. I only saw the two guards go down there.”

It feels like the elevator ride takes several years, but eventually, the elevator shivers to a stop. The door open with a pleasant _ding_. Steve goes first, wand in hand.

The room is huge — high, cavernous ceilings disappear into blackness. On the other side of the room, directly across from them, is a set of stairs leading to — somewhere. Steve doesn’t know where, and he doesn’t really care, because his attention is drawn to the thing in the middle of the room.

There are four reclining chairs circled around a machine in the middle of the room. Three of the chairs are occupied, one is empty. Tubes and wires spout from the machine and connect to the people occupying the chairs; wires are stuck to their skulls, IVs snake into their arms, feeding tubes in their stomachs.

“Mother of fuck,” Sam says — which, yeah, that just about sums it up.

He doesn’t know the exact mechanics of the machine, but he assumes that it somehow records the prophecies that the Diviners See. Steve knows then that he has to destroy it.

But first, Steve makes a beeline for the nearest chair, which holds a girl. Her head is leaned back, eyes closed, mouth agape. Steve touches the back of her hand, and her eyes spring open, head jolting forward. She looks afraid for a second, and then confused. Her eyes are cloudy and opaque — Steve had nearly forgotten that the Seers are all blind.

“Sh,” Steve says. “I’m not them. We’re gonna get you out of here.”

She shakes her head.

“You can’t,” she whispers.

“What—?” Steve starts, and then notices that she is legitimately chained to her chair. “Oh.” He reaches for the chain to touch it, and it lights up at his touch — burning him.

“Fuck!” he curses, shaking out his hand.

The chains are cursed, it seems — they burn every time the person in them moves. Steve wonders what sick fuck came up with that idea.

“Fuck that,” he says, and takes the wand in his hand, wills the chains broken. They pop open, no problem. The girl looks ready to cry, but instead just feels her tender wrist with her other hand in amazement. He helps her to her feet, hands her off to Natasha.

Steve moves on to the next chair, holding another girl—she seems to be older than the others, maybe in her mid-twenties. Steve undoes her chains, hauls her to her feet, and gives her to Peggy.

“We can’t fit everyone in the elevator at the same time,” Sam says, his mouth twisting. “Nat, Peg — you go first. Steve and I will catch up. Get to the quinjet. We’ll meet you there.”

Nat and Peggy nod, bringing the two female Seers with them. Steve moves on to the last Seer, the boy — and Steve sees that he is the worst off of the bunch.

The kid in the chair looks like he’s been crying — his eyes are red and raw, his face a little puffy. However, his skin is pale, tinged green in a way that the others’ was not. He’s sick, clammy, possibly running a fever. Steve isn’t a doctor, but he knows that this kid has not been treated properly by these Hydra assholes.

The kid doesn’t speak, but Steve doesn’t need him to. “I’ve got you,” he whispers. He takes the wand, touches it to the metal, and wills for the chains to break. They fall away, simple as that. His wrists are red and burned. Possibly infected. Fuck.

Sam watches them as he helps the kid up, but he can barely stand. Steve decides to carry him bridal-style, trying not to disturb the feeding tube in his stomach.

He turns around, the kid still in his arms.

And comes face-to-face with just the person he was hoping that he would see, and just the person he feared he would.

Bucky.

He’s standing at the top of the stairs on the other side of the room, having entered silently.  Steve isn’t sure how he got down here — he’s not sure if there are stairs down here, or if there’s another elevator in the other room, or if he was just always in that other room, but he’s here now, and Steve doesn’t know what to do.

Actually, he does.

Steve looks at the kid in his arms. He is quite young, probably still in his teens. “Take him,” he says to Sam. “Take him, take him — go!”

Sam accepts the kid but starts to say, “No, Steve—you—”

“Don’t worry about me!” Steve says, pushing Sam towards the elevator. Bucky is already starting to descend the stairs, and Steve knows that that metal arm of his can do some real fucking damage. There’s a gun in his hand, but he hasn’t used it yet — he probably doesn’t want to risk hurting the Seer.

“Get the Seer out of here. I’ll catch up,” Steve promises. He _hopes_. He holds his wand up, trying to calm his erratic heart.

Sam goes, cursing Steve as he does, running the distance to the elevator; and Bucky — for lack of a better word — pounces. He runs towards Sam and the Seer, his long hair whipping around his face, and Steve doesn’t want to hurt him, but—the Seer—

Steve grabs his arm, trying to distract him, and Bucky just shoves him off and pulls his gun.

“No!” Steve yelps, and grabs the arm that’s holding the gun and _yanks_ — sending the bullet off to the side, away from Sam and the Seer, its intended target.

Then his comm fills with the voices of other people — Natasha telling him _don’t do it Rogers_ and Clint saying _wait, buddy, what’s going on_ and Peggy demanding that he _just leave it, Steven, it’s done now_ —

But it’s not done, is it? Not really. Not until he gets through to Bucky.

He tears the comm out of his ear and throws it to the side.

Steve hears the elevator open and Bucky makes a last-ditch effort to charge in there, but Steve tackles him, sending them both to the floor. The elevator doors close, and Bucky growls in anger. They both scramble to their feet, and finally, finally, Steve is here with him, face-to-face. IT might not be the same, but it’s something. Even if it means that Bucky is throwing punches at him now. It’s something.

But Steve knows this man. He _trained_ this man. He knows every move, every punch he’s going to make. He dodges them effortlessly, rolling and blocking in a way that really seems to piss Bucky off.

Most of his strength seems to be centered around his metal arm, which is no surprise. But what does surprise Steve is that he’s still mostly right-handed, judging by the gun that’s there.

Steve doesn’t want to fight him. He doesn’t want to hurt him. Bucky looks so blank in his eyes, like his soul has been sucked out of his body. Maybe it has.

Bucky hasn’t really landed a punch on him, not yet — the two of them just dance around each other, Bucky charging at him with something akin to rage, and Steve dodging out of the way like he’s afraid to get hit.

It can’t last like this forever. Steve needs to destroy the machine. He needs to make sure that this can’t happen again. At least, not anytime soon.

When Steve dodges this time, He grabs Bucky and swings him around so that his back is against Steve’s front. Steve gets an arm around Bucky’s throat and puts him in a chokehold, feeling guilty the entire time. Bucky puts up a fucking fight, but Steve surprised him — he can’t fight it quick enough.

“I’m sorry, I’m sorry,” Steve is saying. “I’m sorry.” Finally, Bucky goes limp.

Steve has about two minutes until Bucky wakes up.

He moves quickly, going to the machine and looking at it. He doesn’t know exactly what to do, so he decides that setting it on fire is probably the most destructive route. He doesn’t want this shit to get pieced together again. He bangs the machine door open and sees a large green motherboard. The machine must have been some type of computer, but Steve doesn’t dwell on it now. He points his wand inside and wills for it to catch on fire.

It starts small, but a little green flame starts on the motherboard, tiny as a the flame on a birthday candle. Then, it starts spreading. Quickly.

The sound of a gunshot startles him, and then he feels it — the bullet is lodged into his shoulder. _Fuck_ that hurts. In his hurt, his knees buckle and he hits the floor.

 _Bucky’s awake_ , his mind supplies.

Yeah, thanks.

The fire is burning merrily now, the machine up in fucking flames. He doesn’t need the wand to keep it going. Sparks start to fly from out of it, angry and hot. Steve scooches out of the way of the flames, but moving his shoulder hurts, wincing in pain as he goes to stand, slowly.

Bucky is up now, stalking over to him before he can get completely to his feet. With a growl, Bucky grabs the barrel of the gun in his flesh hand and pistol-whips Steve so hard and so suddenly he sees stars. He falls to the ground again, grasping his mouth with one hand. His spits red, his lips and teeth bloodied from the blow he’s just taken.

“Fight back,” Bucky growls. He takes his metal hand and grasps the back of Steve’s neck, squeezing tight and pulling him until he’s kneeling up. “ _Fight_ _back!_ ”

It’s the first words he’s heard Bucky speak in a long time.

The hand on the back of his neck releases, and moves instead to grip his throat.

Steve takes his free hand and wraps it around Bucky’s forearm, but doesn’t try to push or pull them away. The metal on his arm is surprisingly warm — it’s the temperature of his body. It moves and ripples where Steve touches it, like it’s melted.

“Buck,” he rasps. “Bucky, please. You know me.”

His airway isn’t completely cut off—Bucky’s just making it difficult to breathe. Steve knows the power in his arm, he could crush the bones in Steve’s neck if he wanted to. He’s holding back.

“My name isn’t Bucky,” he says through gritted teeth.

“It is,” Steve says. “You know it is.”

Bucky doesn’t say anything to that, just tightens his grip around Steve’s neck a fraction. Steve grips Bucky’s arm tighter for just a second before letting go.

“I’m not gonna fight you,” Steve says, his voice strained from Bucky’s hand. “I’m not gonna fight you. I love you.”

“You’re an idiot,” Bucky growls. “Suicidal.”

 _Calling me an idiot? We must be getting somewhere_ , Steve thinks.

Bucky withdraws his hand only to punch Steve in the face with the other. Steve sputters and falls sideways, onto his forearm, before kneeling up again.

“Buck—”

“Coward,” Bucky growls, lining up another punch. “Fight _back_.”

Steve drops the wand.

He drops it and stares at Bucky as his does it. The curved wood slips slowly from his fingers, as if reluctant to leave him, and clatters to the floor.

“I’m not gonna fight you,” Steve says again. Speaking is difficult and painful with a split lip.

Bucky lunges in his direction, and Steve winces before he realizes that he was just going for the wand and not him. He holds it up, pointing it at Steve, and while he knows that it won’t hurt him greatly, the power in that thing isn’t all too pleasant, either.

“You wanna kill me?” Steve says, with terrible delight. “Do it, then. Pull the trigger, Buck, go on. Pull—”

“Shut up.” The wand lights up at Bucky’s touch, too, sensing his magic. It always lit up yellow for Steve, but with Bucky, it burns a steady, electric blue. He studies it for a second before bringing his gun up to Steve’s head. “You’re more trouble than you’re worth. I don’t know what Hydra would want with you.”

“Then finish it,” Steve says. He can feel the blood dripping down his back, a steady stream of it. He’s lightheaded already, his lip is split. He’s bleeding and hurt everywhere. God, he hurts everywhere.

And he knows now. He always knew it, but the reality is this: if Bucky kills him, he kills him. Steve won’t stop him. He couldn’t, not even if he wanted to.

“Just finish it, Buck.”  His voice is a rasp, gravelly. “You wanna kill me, kill me. I’m no good without you. I’m no fucking good.”

Visibly hesitating, Buck’s hand shakes as he holds the gun. His arm drops, but Steve doesn’t move. He has nothing left to give, no fight left inside of him. He can’t fight Bucky. He won’t. He’s so tired of fighting.

The wounds on his body ache in a deep-tissue kind of way, a hurt on top of a hurt. He closes his eyes for half a second, and forgets to open them again.


	20. Ghost Story

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> That's it, kiddos! I hope you liked this story, and I hope you all stay tuned for the next installment. I don't know when I'm posting it, but if you subscribe to the series you'll be notified when I post it. Or, you can always keep checking back here every once in a while. Thank you all so much for your patience and your compliments. I love you all!

###### BUCKY

_He feels his eyes widen as some strange realization washes over him. Every time Rogers says that name—Bucky—he breaks a little more. His soul—if he has one, that is—cracks with each word._

_He… he remembers—_

**_The bar is poorly lit._ **

_His gun is still in the air, but he feels his arm go weak. His head hurts so much. The world is collapsing all around him and he can’t even think to acknowledge it._

_A seed of horror drops in his stomach and spreads throughout his entire body. He pulls his gun away and leans back on his heels, trying to decide what to do._

**_It’s you. I didn’t think I was ever going to find you._ **

**_What’s your name?_ **

_He clutches his head, terrified, but doesn’t move. His target is just lying there. He’s losing so much blood, he can’t possibly stay awake any longer._

_Rogers’ eyes close, and for one scathing moment, he’s not sure if he’s dead or not. He looks at the wand in his hand and reaches forward. He touches the wand to Rogers’ skin, hopes that this will heal him, and sees his wounds stop, his blood slow._

+++

There are things floating around in his head that he’s not sure are memories or planted thoughts. Bucky doesn’t know what to think of this man, or his perseverance, or his stupidity. Dropping the wand was a stupid idea, but… it might have been the push that Bucky needed to acknowledge his seriousness.

The wand sits strangely in his hand. He feels something inside of him is being tugged down, up through his stomach and out through his hand, just to get a chance to touch this dumb piece of wood.

Memory. What a stupid thing. Memory isn’t a record. It’s just a handle used to manipulate people. He can’t trust his own mind anymore. A _record_ is what he needs — not memory.

He goes over to the black comm that Rogers had tugged out of his ear. He finds the mouthpiece and says, “Your boy needs help.” Then he tosses it to the side and starts to make his way up the stairs. Out this door is an exit to the other side of the building. They sent him down here to deal with the threat of Rogers and his team, but Hydra is cracked and crumbling; they won’t be able to come back from the loss of Project Insight. Pierce threw all his money into this project, he knows. Plus, he can’t deny that he wants to be free from their clutches. He only has his target—Rogers, _Steve Rogers_ —to thank for that.

For that, he’ll leave him here, alive. Hydra wanted him dead, but… fuck Hydra.

He has a few leads he needs to follow up on. There are a few things that he wants to check. He can remember a man, with dark hair… his handler…

Besides, he has very important things to do at the moment. There’s a diner a mile and a half from here. His stomach is rumbling. He finds an exit to the ground floor, and walks out the front door as the emergency lights flash above him.

 

**END OF PART TWO**


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